Lizzo was my favorite performance at the Grammys 2020 (Newsletter No. 22)
Lizzo! So committal! So precisely brash! Watching her Grammys 2020 performance was like watching someone take a running leap without pretense and land smack dab on the bullseye. Let me explain:
1. “Tonight is for Kobe.” She succinctly shoots your heart, doesn’t linger, instead dives straight into wailing the devastating chorus “Cuz I loovee you”
2. Conducts her musicians with the might of King Triton. Her back to the audience until she turns around showing the full force-field of her presence, black starry sky.
3. The orchestral arrangement as wavy as the Mars-like terrain the musicians are perched on. The acoustic instruments! The synchronized attitude and choreography of the background musicians! The mostly black female musicians!
Truth Hurts:
1. The black and curvy ballerinas that were a mix of classical, electronic music rave and do-rags.
2. Lizzo and the rest’s glow stick costumes.
3. “Why men great till they gotta be great,” then the music trills a swell and stops with a clean cut.
4. The music that is the perfect mixture of classical, electronic rock and hip hop. Before you can get lulled into a groove it switches up again.
5. The Sonic the Hedgehog sound effect.
6. All the bobbly bouncy dance moves.
7. How Lizzo effortlessly swims between faux-aggressive and blasé rapping, chanting and belting. She yells, then pulls back to a cruise, then sneak attacks again.
8. She’s singing her lungs out while dancing her butt off and then with no preparation, launches into an all-out flute solo. An instrument that still requires her lungs!
9. That part in the flute solo that sounds like something from Sesame Street. That part where every note she blows is matched by the backing musicians.
10. The full force of bum bum ba dums is so badass and silly.
11. “Welcome to the Grammys, b*tch” at the end of her performance felt like she was exclaiming it to the baby band geek inside her, “look how far we’ve come,” as much as she was saying it to the audience.
12. Her rah-rah giddiness after she finished. Nevermind the standing ovation. Man, she’s having a blast! She's having so much fun!!!
Watch it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PFlvxnou9UQ
And if you want to admire her even more: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADbCY9Le_xw
and this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzsnJI7NeEo (there’s some overlap between the two videos)
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I also loved:
Rosalía: Her voice is like running water. Flamenco for the new age. Malamente felt red and dangerous. The sadness of the minor melody feels so wrong but hits so right. Her bravado.
Ariana Grande: Sooo meticulous and sassy and bittersweet. Her bravado.
Demi Lovato: Straight to the point. The most meta performance.
H.E.R. : The choreography of the background musicians. How smoothly she moved from piano to guitar, smooth as her voice. There was a motherly quality to her performance. It wasn’t overtly emotional, it was expert and calm.
For Demi and Ariana, the striking juxtaposition between how every inch of them covered in a thick buttery shield of glowy makeup, their showy glam gowns, and their palpable loneliness was the stuff of life imitating art…I don’t think it’s worth it. And I don’t think they think it is, either.