Yesterday, Americans were shocked to learn that while Beyonce gave a stellar performance singing the National Anthem at President Obama's second-term inauguration on Monday, the Grammy Award-winning singer may have been lip-syncing.
On Tuesday, a spokeswoman for the Marine Band, Master Sgt. Kristin duBois, said Queen Bey was lip-syncing to the song that she recorded at a Marine Corps studio in Washington on Sunday night. "The entire performance was live except for the national anthem," said Sergeant duBois. "It's not because Beyoncé can't sing. We all know Beyoncé can sing. We all know the Marine Band can play."
Later on Tuesday, the Marine Corps spokesman Capt. Gregory Wolf gave a contradicting statement saying "no one in the Marine Band is in a position to assess whether it was live or pre-recorded."
In response to Bey's lip-syncing controversy, the Queen of Soul, singer Aretha Franklin, chimed in stating that she "laughed" when she first heard about it. Franklin, who gave a memorable performance of "My Country 'Tis Of Thee" at Obama's first inauguration, told ABC News, "When I heard that I just really cracked up. I thought it was really funny, but she did a beautiful job with the pre-record ... next time I'll probably do the same."
The soul singer added, "I thought it was funny because the weather down there was about 46 or 44 degrees and for most singers that is just not good singing weather."
In 2009, she chose not to lip-sync despite the frigid temperature stating, "I wanted to give people the real thing and pre-recording never crossed my mind." However, she admitted that the cold affected her vocals. "Had I not had to sit that long, I had to sit for 45 or 30 minutes and it was much colder, it was in the 20s."
According to the legendary singer, it's not necessarily wrong if Beyonce did indeed lip-sync. "I think it's optional really, it's up to the artist. In 2009, I wanted everything to be live and on the real side for the moment as it actually happened. Those were my feelings for my performance, but having come face to face with 28, 22 degrees I am not surprised she pre-recorded. She wanted her performance to be what she wanted to be and she realized it wasn't going to be the way she wanted it to be or she was going to be running a risk. That's probably why she pre-recorded exactly how she wanted it to be heard."
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Beyonce Lip Sync National Anthem? Marine Corps Confirms Singer Used Pre-Recorded Song At Obama's Inauguration