Sunday night’s BET Awards began with an act that wasn’t on the schedule — Beyoncé and Kendrick Lamar performing “Freedom,” the anthemic track from Beyoncé’s album Lemonade.
It was an intense, thoroughly choreographed performance, replete with flying sparks and smoke and a stage that looked convincingly like it was made of molten lava.
Beyoncé has recently taken to marketing herself as a political artist of sorts, and Sunday night’s show wasn’t an exception — it began with a voice-over from Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech.