Beyoncé in India

Beyoncé doesn’t perform at parties on the regular. Beyoncé isn’t showing up at bat mitzvahs or birthdays or pre-wedding festivities for just anyone. So, what does it take for Beyonce to show up? You just have to be the heiress to the richest man in India, a successful businesswoman in your own right and marrying one of the wealthiest business tycoons in the world. No big deal. Over the weekend, Beyoncé performed in Udaipur, India for the pre-wedding celebrations of Isha Ambani (Yale grad, businesswomen and heiress to Mukesh Ambani, who is worth a cool $47 billion) and Anand Piramal (also from a rich family and executive director of Piramal Group and Piramal Realty). I can barely fathom how much money you need to make to be able to afford BEYONCÉ at your wedding. These people are RICH rich, like Crazy Rich Asians rich, like BEYONCÉ PERFORMED AT THEIR WEDDING rich.  

Like we just saw with Priyanka Chopra and Nick Jonas’s wedding, pre-wedding celebrations for an Indian wedding are extravagant. They involve days of song, dance, and performances leading up to the wedding day, which isn’t until Wednesday. The pre-wedding festivities are intense. They are GREAT for gossip. Priyanka and Nick were also in attendance at Isha and Anand’s pre-wedding parties. And so were Hillary Clinton, MISS TINA, Ariana Huffington and all the biggest Bollywood stars (many performed at their sangeet). I really didn’t think we’d be discussing an even more lavish and star-studded Indian wedding this soon after Priyanka and Nick’s but apparently, I don’t know sh-t because THIS is the Indian wedding of the year. 

Again, they got BEYONCÉ to perform. I will never get over this. And because she’s Beyoncé, she didn’t phone in the performance even though she could have. Listen, as rich and as big as this wedding is, it isn’t the Grammys. It isn’t the VMAs. Beyoncé didn’t have to go as hard as she did – with multiple NEW outfit changes— but she did. Of course, she did. Every good Beyoncé surprise comes with corresponding posts on her IG and Beyonce.com. We got great looks at her outfits designed by Khosla Jani, the fashion house by Indian designers Abu Jani and Sandeep Khosla. 

This one is my favourite:

Beyoncé Legion came through with the details. 

So far, through my exhaustive creeping of Isha Ambani’s pre-wedding festivities, it looks like Beyoncé performed “Perfect,” “Single Ladies,” “Naughty Girl,” “Run the World (Girls),” “Déjà vu,” “Green Light,” “Drunk In Love”, and “Crazy In Love.” That is basically a full set. Some people might not want Beyoncé to perform a full set at their wedding. Something about upstaging the bride or whatever. These people are not my people. I would let Beyoncé perform in the middle of my ceremony. UPSTAGE ME, PLEASE.  

Look at God. Beyoncé brought her A Game (the only game she possesses) to Isha Ambani’s wedding. Our Queen will probably not be bringing that game to the Grammys. At this point, an extravagant Indian wedding deserves our Queen’s presence more than the Grammys do. 

The Recording Academy gave nominations to The Carters’ Everything Is Love for Best R&B Performance, Best Urban Contemporary Album, and Best Music Video. So, they were relegated to the “urban” and genre categories and shut out of the big nominations like Song of the Year, Record of the Year, and Album of the Year. I don’t know if Everything is Love is the album of the year but I do know it’s worthier of a nomination than Post Malone’s Beer Bongs and Bentleys. I couldn’t even type that with a straight face. Everything Is Love belongs in the category. The song that’s nominated for Best R&B Performance is “Summer.” WHERE ARE THE NOMS FOR “APESH-T”? That song deserves recognition beyond its incredible video. I’m not mad at most of the Grammy nominations this year but the amount of times they’ve disrespected Beyoncé and her work does make me mad. 

I don’t think Bey or Jay are mad though. I think they gave up on the Grammys after Lemonade didn’t win Album of the Year. I think they gave up on the Grammys a long time ago. That’s unfortunate because I would have loved to see The Carters go apesh-t at the Grammys.