I’m working on getting back into the swing of writing blogs again. Since I’ve finished with school and no longer obligated to submit written assignments by a certain timetable, it’s taken some time to write for enjoyment. But I’m going to do my very best and write on a regular basis.
A couple weeks back, Facebook was swarming with teasers about Beyonce performing at the CMA Awards. For a majority of Beyonce fans, this was a new territory that was being ventured. Beyonce performing at the CMA Awards meant that an audience that probably never cared for or listened to country music would now tune in with anticipation.
On the very night, Beyonce fans and more witnessed her grace the stage and sang Daddy Lessons alongside the the well-known country girl group, Dixie Chicks. I think that this was an amazing way to bridge the gap between pop and country music audience. It was a great performance that paid homage to the country music genre. I feel that this was an opportunity for her to tap into her Houston country roots. By introducing Beyonce on the set, the CMA Awards were able to tap into a whole new target audience, this was a smart and executed marketing strategy.
Unfortunately, this story doesn’t have a happy ending. Her performance caused a huge uproar and the CMA received backlash for inviting her in the first place. I recently read an article that disclosed that many viewers and participators felts that Beyonce had no place at the award ceremony. What was interesting was the fact that many fans were upset at the fact that both Dixie Chicks and Beyonce performed due to Beyonce’s stand on the Black Lives Matter movement and that neither of them are considered country musicians and don’t represent the ideologies of country music.
I think what’s interesting is that at last years CMAs Justin Timberlake’s performance was not widely accepted but was not perceived as controversial. What makes matters worse is that after the CMAs received negative statements throughout their social media platforms, they decided to scrub away any trace of Beyonce on their social media. According to the chief executive of the CMA, they indicated that they took them down because Beyonce’s team had not approved of those promotional clips to be used. Whether this is true or not, there’s no way to confirm but honestly I find this quite comical.
Although I’m not an avid country music fan or Beyhive, I’m both disappointed with the CMAs but at the same time not at all surprised. I’m disappointed because when making the plans and the line-up for who would be performing at the CMA Awards, when deciding to bring on Beyonce, the team should have naturally outweighed the pros and the cons. They should have recognized that while Beyonce would lead them to tap into a target audience they never had access before that at the same time there would be some racial backlash from the country music community. I also feel like they should have taken a better stance against those who had something negative to say instead of rolling over and giving excuses every step of the way. As as I said before, at the same time I’m not surprised because it appears that racism is not a thing of the past so unfortunately something like this happening is not farfetched. It doesn’t make it ok but definitely not farfetched.
In the midst of the negative backlash, the chief executive made the following statement as if to say publicity, whether good or bad, is publicity. While this may be true, I don’t know if publicity at the expense of someone else is a good thing.
“We stand by it. If a program moves people so much one way or another, I think we’ve had a successful show.” “We believe in free speech and people can post what they’re going to post,” she added. “It’s about the music, not about politics.”
I’d love to hear your thoughts and insight on the topic, I’ve posted a video of the performance below.
For the Love of Music 