During Sunday night’s Grammy Awards ceremony, there was a bit of controversy surrounding the fact that Beyoncé was chosen to perform “Take My Hand, Precious Lord” instead of Ledisi, who portrayed Mahalia Jackson and performed the song in the Selma biopic. Many Ledisi fans felt that not having the soul singer perform on the Grammys was a huge snub, and Beyoncé should have performed one of her own songs.
“Ledisi sung it in the Selma film, so they should have asked her,” one tweet read. “Beyoncé doesn’t have the chops for that one. She’ll overdo it.”
During the red-carpet event, Ledisi responded to the controversy.
“What I will say and what I’m excited about is that I had the pleasure of playing an iconic figure in Selma, and the song, ‘Take My Hand, Precious Lord,’ it’s been going on forever—starting with the queen Mahalia [Jackson], the queen of soul Aretha Franklin,” Ledisi told ET’s Kevin Frazier on the carpet.
“Then I was able to portray and sing my version of the song, and now we have Beyoncé. Her generation will now know the song, so I’m a part of history,” she continued.
John Legend and Common, who performed their award-winning song “Glory,” stated that it was Beyoncé who approached them about performing the song as an introduction to their performance.
“We were actually approached by Beyoncé. She wanted to do an intro to our performance and introduce us,” Legend told Frazier. “You don’t really say no to Beyoncé if she asks to perform with you.”
Well, many people on Twitter thought that maybe they should have said no.
https://twitter.com/CreativelyYours/status/564642825909071873https://twitter.com/dtafakari/status/564645633026318339https://twitter.com/AntheaButler/status/564643481189351424https://twitter.com/UrbanCusp/status/564643992982540288
Here are both versions of “Take My Hand, Precious Lord.” You be the judge. Who sang it better: Beyoncé or Ledisi?