By the age of twenty-one, Beyoncé Giselle Knowles from Houston, Texas, had become world-famous for her singing and songwriting. After attaining wide success with the R&B group Destiny’s Child, Knowles broke out on her own, releasing her solo debut, Dangerously in Love, in 2003. The single “Crazy in Love,” featuring her then-boyfriend, now husband, rapper and businessman Jay-Z, was one of the biggest hits of the summer of 2003. The song propelled the album to multimillion-unit sales and earned Knowles a number of awards, including a Grammy Award and an MTV Video Music Award.
A little over a decade later, tons of more awards, unforgettable performances at the Superbowl and Video Music Awards, and the birth of three children, the Queen of the Beyhive shows no signs of slowing down her impact on music or popular culture.
But Saturday night, Queen Bey took it to another level by performing at Coachella.
Excited fans had a new nickname for this year’s festival: Beychella. Other headliners included the Weeknd and Eminem.
“Coachella, thank you for allowing me to be the first black woman to headline,” Beyoncé said, before singing “Run the World (Girls).”
The singer opened her long-anticipated performance singing “Crazy in Love” accompanied by a New Orleans-style brass marching band, and later crooned a rendition of “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also known as the black national anthem.
She sang several songs from her album “Lemonade,” backed up by the band and surrounded by step dancers.
For nearly two hours, Beyoncé revealed surprise after surprise.
A tribute to Nina Simone and quotes from Malcolm X. She also sang “Deja Vu” with her husband, Jay-Z, and danced with her sister, Solange.
“My main accomplishment is achieving peace and happiness,” explains Beyonce in an Essence interview. “Sometimes you think it’s success, and you think that it’s being a big star. But I want respect, and I want friendship and love and laughter, and I want to grow.”
Her and Jay-Z are fiercely private when it comes to their relationship and family, but the mom of three — who welcomed Blue Ivy, in January 2012 — hasn’t held back when it comes to talking about how much motherhood has changed her life.
“[Having a daughter] just gives you purpose and all of the things that my self-esteem was associated with, it’s all completely different,” she told Anderson Cooper the same year she gave birth to Blue.
“Even the silliest little thing that you hear on the radio, it comes from something deeper. ’Bootylicious’ was funny, but it came from people saying that I had gained weight and me being like, ’I’m a southern woman, and this is how southern women are.’ My motivation is always to express something or to heal from something or to laugh and rejoice about something.”
“One of the reasons I connect to the Super Bowl is that I approach my shows like an athlete,” she says now. “You know how they sit down and…
… watch whoever they’re going to play and study themselves? That’s how I treat this. I watch my performances, and I wish I could just enjoy them, but I see the light that was late. I see, ’Oh God, that hair did not work.’ Or ’I should never do that again.’ I try to perfect myself. I want to grow, and I’m always eager for new information.”
She loves being onstage, she says, because it is the one time her inner critic goes silent. “I love my job, but it’s more than that: I need it,” she says. “Because before I gave birth, it was the only time in my life, all throughout my life, that I was lost.” She means this in a good way: When her brain turns off, it is, frankly, a relief. After drilling herself, repeating every move so many times, locking them in, she can then afford not to think. “It’s like a blackout. When I’m onstage, I don’t know what the crap happens. I am gone.”
Whether she’s on stage, spending time with her family or using her celebrity to help others in need like she’s doing now for the victims of Hurricane Harvey, we know Beyonce is going to put her all into it and we look forward to the next chapter of life, love and music.
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