John Legend Performs for First Time Since His Baby’s Death at BBMAs

Tonight is the 2020 Billboard Music Awards, and superstar John Legend is one of the performers. Legend will be performing the song “Never Break” from his most-recent album Bigger Love. 

Other performers at this year’s Billboard Music Awards include Post Malone, Garth Brooks, Brandy, Kane Brown, BTS, Kelly Clarkson, Doja Cat, Sheila E, En Vogue, Alicia Keys, Demi Lovato, Pentatonix, Sia and more.

Just a few weeks ago, Legend and wife Chrissy Teigen revealed that their baby had not survived Teigen’s hospitalization. This will be Legend’s first performance since the loss of his child.

Legend Will Be Performing “Never Break” at the Billboard Music Awards

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We are shocked and in the kind of deep pain you only hear about, the kind of pain we’ve never felt before. We were never able to stop the bleeding and give our baby the fluids he needed, despite bags and bags of blood transfusions. It just wasn’t enough. . . We never decide on our babies’ names until the last possible moment after they’re born, just before we leave the hospital.  But we, for some reason, had started to call this little guy in my belly Jack.  So he will always be Jack to us.  Jack worked so hard to be a part of our little family, and he will be, forever. . . To our Jack – I’m so sorry that the first few moments of your life were met with so many complications, that we couldn’t give you the home you needed to survive.  We will always love you. . . Thank you to everyone who has been sending us positive energy, thoughts and prayers.  We feel all of your love and truly appreciate you. . . We are so grateful for the life we have, for our wonderful babies Luna and Miles, for all the amazing things we’ve been able to experience.  But everyday can’t be full of sunshine.  On this darkest of days, we will grieve, we will cry our eyes out. But we will hug and love each other harder and get through it.

A post shared by chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) on Sep 30, 2020 at 8:58pm PDT

Legend will be performing his hit song “Never Break,” which he also performed at this year’s BET Awards on June 28. That performance was emotional for an entirely different reason than tonight’s will be.

It’s likely that Legend will dedicate the performance to his late son, who he and Teigen named Jack, as the song is about perseverance in the wake of adversity and pain.

“Whenever life is hard, we’ll never lose our way, ’cause we both know who we are,” the first verse reads. “Who knows about tomorrow? We don’t know what’s in the stars, I just know I’ll always follow the light in your heart.”

The chorus continues that theme, repeating the words “We will never break.”

Legend Is Not Nominated For Any BBMAs This Year

VideoVideo related to john legend performs for first time since his baby’s death at bbmas2020-10-14T11:34:44-04:00

There are a number of artists up for awards at this year’s awards, but John Legend is not one of them.

BBMA nominees and winners are chosen based on fan interactions with music, according to Broadway World. The ways that fans interact that are counted toward the awards include buying the albums and songs digitally, streaming the songs, how much radio airplay songs received as well as social engagement.

The specific awards this time around are based on the period of March 23, 2019 through March 14, 2020.

The top nominee this year is Post Malone, who was nominated 16 times across 15 categories. Lil Nas X is nominated 13 times and Billie Eilish was nominated 12 times alongside D.J. Khalid.

This year’s nominees for Top Artist include Billie Eilish, the Jonas Brothers, Khalid, Post Malone and Taylor Swift. Top New Artist nominees include DaBaby, Billie Eilish, Lil Nas X, Lizzo and Roddy Ricch.

The show airs tonight, October 14, 2020 at 8 p.m. ET on NBC.

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