Madonna took to the stage at the Billboard Music Awards on Sunday night to pay tribute to Prince in a very big way, as she belted out his hit “Nothing Compares 2 U” before bringing Stevie Wonder onstage to perform “Purple Rain.”
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Madonna had personal and professional ties to Prince, who died on April 21, because not only did they briefly date in 1985 but they also collaborated on her track “Love Song.” But many people were against Madonna being the only artist to pay tribute to Prince because a Change.org petition entitled “Stop Madonna from being the only artist tributing Prince during the Billboard Awards” amassed almost 9,000 signatures (Wonder was a surprise performer).
We’d like to say most people got onboard with Madonna and Stevie Wonder’s tribute, but that doesn’t appear to be true, most certainly not the folks behind the BET awards’ Twitter handle.
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BET sent out a tweet teasing their own Prince tribute (which is set to take place on June 26) which states “Yeah, we saw that. Don’t worry. We got you.” They captioned the tweet with a simple, “#BETAwards #PrinceTribute.”
Yeah, so Madonna’s tribute was definitely not everyone’s cup of tea, but Billboard Music Awards executive producer, Mark Bracco, previously shared his thoughts on the organization’s decision with The Associated Press, via Entertainment Tonight Canada.
“Listen, I think everybody is entitled to their opinion and everyone can have their own opinion, but I will say that we are honored and could not be more excited for Madonna to be on the show and to pay tribute to someone that was her friend and her peer and her colleague,” Bracco said. “I think it’s going to be fantastic.”
Bracco continued, “It’s going to be very, very intimate and very respectful, and I think it’s something that is really going to pay tribute to Prince as the incredible, groundbreaking artist that he was and the influence that he had on music.”
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But what did you think? Was the tribute fantastic? Or are you with BET on this one? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.
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