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On Monday, when we were recapping the Billboard Music Awards, I put up the video of Beyonce’s tribute, as well as her performance of her new single “Run the World (Girls)”. While I’m still not a fan of the song, I thought the performance was pretty decent (my problem was that the people paying tribute to Beyonce made her sound like Nelson Mandela, which she’s not). Anyway, soon after Beyonce’s performance, some people were like “Hey, that junk looks kind of familiar.” It turns out that Beyonce kind of hijacked (“stole”) the concept of the of the performance – SOME say – from an Italian pop artist named Lorella Cuccarini. For reference, here is Beyonce’s Billboard performance:
And here’s a YouTube side-by-side comparison of Bey’s performance with a 2010 performance by Lorella Cuccarini:
They are similar. Similar in visual concept, similar in approach, and they give the same vibe. But I wouldn’t call it an outright copy or theft. Except for the wing thing. The wing parts on both videos – yeah, Bey jacked that.
Anyway, AOL Music got an exclusive quote from Bey about the accusations that she’s unoriginal. Beyonce cops to knowing who Lorella is, and being familiar with the 2010 performance:
When Beyonce took to the stage at the 2011 Billboard Music Awards this past Sunday (May 22), she gave what was, quite possibly, the performance of her lifetime. It certainly ranks up there among the most memorable in the award show’s history. Honored with the Billboard Millennium Award, Beyonce performed her current single, ‘Run the World (Girls)’ while dancing and interacting with high-tech video projections synced behind her.
Indeed, the word “epic” comes to mind, as it was a dazzling marriage of choreography and technology, the likes of which have rarely been seen on live television. However, some have argued that the word “groundbreaking” might be misleading — Beyonce’s performance may have been unique in its execution, but the basic idea actually came from a performance by Italian pop singer Lorella Cuccerini in 2010. The visuals, dancing and even sequencing are remarkably similar at points. That’s no coincidence, nor is it a rip-off. Rather, Beyonce acknowledges the direct influence.
“My makeup artist showed me the performance of Lorella Cuccarini a year ago, and it inspired me so much,” Beyonce tells AOL Music, exclusively. “I then met with the talented people who worked on it. The technology and concept were so genius. Thank god for YouTube or I would have never been exposed to something so inspiring. I never worked so hard on anything in my life as that performance for the Billboard Awards.”
Naturally, YouTube is now flooded with side-by-side comparisons of the two performances and, yes, it is fascinating to see how ideas can evolve from one creative entity to the next. But whereas critics are quick to point out influences, musicians are more prone to identify them as inspiration. In turn, Beyonce’s performance will now, no doubt, “influence” other artists at future award shows. For proof, check back next year. And that, of course, is exactly why Beyonce is a Billboard Millennium Award recipient.
[From AOL Music]
Well, at least Beyonce is gracious about it and she didn’t try to pull the old “OMG, it’s original, I’m original, STFU!!” I tend to think that Beyonce was truly inspired by the 2010 performance and tried to come up with her own Beyonce-flavored version, using the 2010 performance as an inspiration.
By the way, Bey’s face still looks “different” to me. I still can’t put my finger on exactly what’s “off” though.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
Written by Kaiser
Posted in Beyonce, Plagiarism
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62 Responses to “Did Beyonce copy her Billboard performance from an Italian pop artist?”
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I saw a comparison of the two on Yahoo this morning and yeah, she lifted it. She should have changed it up more if she wanted to claim it as simply ‘inspiration’ and not a copy or homage.
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These two performances don’t look anything alike.
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Karma is a bitch. Right B?
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She is actually giving the source credit and said she hired the same people who put it together. I dont see the big deal in this.
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She looks like she’s morphing into Shakira!
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I see someone who took an idea and made it their own. Gaga is a dumb b*tch who never gives props to anyone and acts like she is original when she isn’t. Beyonce has for years given tons of feedback and acknowledgement to black/white/yellow/purple artists, dead-alive, foreign or american from this year or yesteryear. I am not a hardcore fan by any means but when is the nitpicking going to stop? I think it was extremely well executed and she did an amazing job with this show. Plus she worked with the people who did the original format. You can’t ask for more than that. She’s an entertainer who influences our younger (and older generation) certainly not someone like Mandela but the Son of Sam was encouraged to kill by a dog of all things, so who is to say LOL
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Beyonce doesn’t give props INITIALLY, she always does it after the fact. Good PR, I say.
Great performer, but not the most original. Granted, there is nothing NEW under the sun, but people act as if she’s just…THE Baddest ever!
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I think its because she has gray eyebrows…
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lol @ franny >_<
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And her performance was great, but she was too tired to even sing! Not knocking because I can’t do it…but yall, come on.
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just when I thought how original and genius was that Billboard performance’s idea…
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@Kaiser Something is different through the chin and lips, makes everything in the area look a little … ‘Joker’-ish?
Plus her eyebrows seem higher in all the photos …? Higher but evenly so …
JMHO
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Trent Reznor has been doing a concept similar to this since 2009. Only, in his productions, about 40% is actually prearranged. The rest is done on the fly with smaller touch screen panels in front of each band member.So each person can manipulate the images as the performance goes on and it all kinda meshes together in the three giant screens. So really, no one is original.
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Cuccarini is not a pop singer. This is not her job. She is a very experienced and successful TV host, but she can dance, sing and act on stage. And she is 46 years old.
Beyonce didn’t hire the same people to put it together. She only got “inspired”.
Strange to see a young global pop star with illimitate budget “getting inspiration” from an older local artist to find something fresh and original for her performance.
Isn’t she paid enough to develop something really original for her fans?
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I disagree with Ari – Gaga has said that she is influenced by many former/current artists, she just makes it her own.
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She’s just using similar technology…those were two completely different performances using similar technology/techniques. It’s like a music video that’s all in black-and-white except for a few items being in color…who know who did that first, but it’s been done many times in many different ways. Not copying. Not stealing.
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man, i LOVE it when my spidey-senses are right! something was off with that performance from me from the jump!
what the F*CK she did, was copy different parts and rearrange them in her performance, go to YouTube & if i’m lyin’, i’m flyin’.
Exhibit A:
the birds
the wings
the drumming motion
the multiple ‘hers’
the army of people
the geometric graphics
the exploding spheres
the expanding spheres
the hand motions ‘of’ expanding the spheres
the diagonal arm dance moves, i.e. ‘Rhythm Nation’
i was so sick to my stomach to see how she jacked Lorella (?), i was physically repulsed!
how an entertainer on her level could be such a pety, theivin’ ASS is beyond me.
the ONLY ‘originality’ *major eyeroll* that Beyoncé brought to that performance was her stripper PUSSY-POPPIN’ (sorry, i’m that angry) moves that she has seemed to mainstream worldwide into the acceptance of her drones & psychophants!
i mean 1st there was 2007 BET awards (which i thought she was FANTASTIC) but turns out she fuggin’ EXACTLY jacked Kylie Minogue’s ‘Metropolis’ openeing performance from Kylie’s
Come Into My World Fever Tour Manchester which was astounding, bold-faced & brazen:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6do7xqU0pIM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cf0ZS1EJjSM (begin at min 2:24)
i mean i can’t stand a f*cking biter, period!
i know i may sound old school, but i grew up with ‘VASTLY’ different female superstar artists and none to my knowledge bit (copied) off one another:
Aretha Franklin
Donna Summer
Barbra Streisand
Patti Labelle (and YES, i know…P-Funk!)
Tina Turner
Cyndi Lauper
Grace Jones
Diana Ross
Madonna!!!!
Beyoncé has O-F-F-I-C-I-A-L-L-Y…
JUMPED.
THE.
SHARK!
sorry, to rant. i’m done ranting, & i’m done with her non-original ass.
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Lifting on her jaw, new nose, botox on forehead/eyes/cheeks and a skin more light. At the end, she will be white.
Her song is a mess, her performance is OVERATED. She tries to HARD for nothing, just an illusion.
I prefer Adele. More simple.
Leigh you are right, her smile is Joker-ish kind of scaring.
tori:
May 25th, 2011 at 2:13 pm Cuccarini is not a pop singer. This is not her job. She is a very experienced and successful TV host, but she can dance, sing and act on stage. And she is 46 years old.
Beyonce didn’t hire the same people to put it together. She only got “inspired”.
Strange to see a young global pop star with illimitate budget “getting inspiration” from an older local artist to find something fresh and original for her performance.
Isn’t she paid enough to develop something really original for her fans?
Funny!
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In the comparison video, my eye was always drawn to the Italian performance. Nothing interesting about an army of Beyonces, one is more than enough. And her song is horrible.
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Of course she stole, I mean was “Inspired” because of course she can ALWAYS do it better…
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about her face,she’s skinnier and specially she has a new shinnier nose and i guess it ‘s the same peoples who worked with Beyonce and the italian woman
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Beyonce difinitely plagerized the concept and some of the ideas from her Italian counterpart. Of course when you steal someone else idea, one must try to mask the similarities as much as posssible and that’s what B did.
Not original at all and not something N Mandela would do.
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DAAAYUM B AGAIN??!!
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I am a stickler for giving artists of whatever kind their credit–and I lose respect for anyone who steals credit or undervalues/distorts the significance of contributions from less powerful(aka moneyed) creative people. I’m talking about what Beyonce does regularly to songwriters, what Aronofsky and the “Black Swan” producers did, and what Emma Thompson is currently doing to a playwright. So this news interested me. But I just watched the video and please. This *is* just Inspiration. Even the wing thing?- please. They are different representations of wings entirely. And anyway wings are universally used as symbolism in art. No artist owns the rights on wings-usage. These two presentations are the same idea as far as presentation goes but the CONTENT is totally different so how is she copying? And anyway this is NOT the first time this concept has been done. This is nothing but mixed-media/performance art presentation …..and it gets done monthly at every art school across the world. The only difference is Beyonce and the Italian celebrity have bigger projectors and huge stages to stand on.
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Just a quick correction, it’s Lorella CuccArini, a singer/show girl who’s been around for quite some time but is still beloved. She’s kind of light and funny, I like her.
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She’s tarnished her reputation so bad, I think no matter what Beyonce does at this point people are going to think she’s swiping and claiming other peoples everything. Because we know she has no qualms with doing that. However, in this case, I don’t think the charge is warranted.
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The influence is obvious but Beyonce definitely took it to the next level. Her performance was pure energy and required razor sharp choreography to pull it off, whereas the other pop star kind of just stood there and let the special effects do most of the work. I can’t hate on Beyonce for this, she put on a damn good performance.
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It’s “Cuccarini” not Cuccerini!
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Meh…so they’re both using video…who cares? Neither of those artists invented video. There’s a lot of hate for B, but I think out of the current bunch of pop singers, she’s probably one of the most talented. The song still sucks, but B performs the hell out of it! She almost makes it sound good.
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Serena – fixed it.
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Performance aside neelyo is right the song is terrible – does bouncy have any musical sense at all; that’s not even a song as commentators have remarked it’s random phrases strung together. This ho is seriously self-deluded and verging on repulsive.
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Laurie Anderson was using the same concepts in the mid 1970s. THESE ARE CONCEPTS AND TECHNIQUES PEOPLE AND ANYONE CAN USE THEM. Good God, it’s like saying so-and-so painted their house pink so anyone else who paints their house pink is ripping them off. Musical styles are nothing more than artistic palettes, just like a paintbox, and EVERYONE USES THEM in their own way. It’s sad when Americans are so f’ing ignorant that they can’t tell the difference. Pretty ironic in a country that has the highest rate of musical theft in the world, whining about one artist using the same graphics technology as another one. Pathetic and hypocritical.
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If someone was blind, they would not be able to see her “show” to go with her song – so with only her caterwaulin voice to go on – about some silly preteen ghetto-club inspired message- there is nothing to really like. OVER RATED.
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This reminds me of “If I were a boy” originally by BC Jean and inspiration from the E-Label studded leggings that were going to be sold by Dereon. She takes things that are not hers, come up with something more original Bey.
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Why wouldn’t she steal it? She’s been known to take credit for so many things that she had nothing to do with. She only will give credit after the fact when people have busted her ass on it. She always claims to write all her own songs but then it turns out she wrote a verse. Bey needs to get over herself already.
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i was so damn angry b4, i left out Cher!
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Ugh not this chick again!
And here’s just a few things she has stolen:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1090014/Stop-thief-Copycat-Beyonc-images-shes-stolen-years.html
If you Google the words Beyonce the copycat you can see everything she has claimed to have been “inspired” with. Once or twice is fine but this chick has literally made a career out of jackin’ other people’s ideas.
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Meh…she’s no worse than other artist out there claiming “inspiration”. She’s a modern day Elvis.
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Forget the stageshow. The actual music is stolen. It’s a Major Lazer sample from ‘Pon De Floor’ and personally I’d love her to re create the original clip.
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“Except for the wing thing”?
Serious? She totally copied it! Of course some “adaptations” would have to be done, but that was about it. She hijacked it.
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i’ve seen artist’s use background’s like that before.. it’s no new.. who cares.. Beyonce’s was way better & she danced a lot more..
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This is the woman who claimed she wrote “Silent Night”.
I think she’s a hack, personally.
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Why the surprise, Beyonce has been stealing ideas from the get go. every single thing she has done have been stolen from some other artist but switched around a little bit. But people have been overlooking it because of her personal beauty she has been able to fake it. There is an old saying, You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.
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Who cares. It was a great performance. If Beyonce would not copy cat it then we would never see that greatness.
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Don’t like Beyonce, don’t much like her new song but I’ve always admired her high energy performances. Chica brings it when she performs and I’m not going to lie, I was entertained.
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I’ve seen a performance in Tokyo years ago where the musicians used magic projectors to allow images and animation to synchronize to the music and interact with the band. No white screen just subway walls, so it gets quite unpredictable. It wasn’t as grandeur as Bey’s or Lorella’s (in fact they used only stick figures) but the Japanese band featured puppies, kittens and goldfish and lot more kitties. So those Japanese guys did it best.
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The song itself is awful, but she didn’t steal this. Some of the moves are similar but acknowleged. No smoking gun here.
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I remember seeing an article years ago on how Britney Spears had rappelled out of the ceiling to enter on an awards show and then whipped off her trench coat as she began. Beyonce jacked it barely a year or two later, even down to the trench coat. She cops to what she does AFTER she gets caught. She’s not original and stealing other people’s ideas and work is not acceptable if you then confess to it afterwards.
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Very similar, but I’ve seen worse copying.
That song is horrid.
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I did not care for her performance tonight on American Idol. I thought it was “blah”!
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I kid you not, my in-laws (in their late 50s to early 60s) LOVE Beyonce and went to see her last show when she was here, and they raved about her performance, presentation and graciousness to fans. So their opinion has some weight with me when I say I agree with other posters who say (regardless of inspiration / imitation / copycat issues) Beyonce really is a stellar performer – and she gives it her all on stage. When you pay to see stuff like this, all of the above counts and I’m glad my in-laws had such a great time!
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she also -hijacked (“stole”)- someone elses blonde wig! GROSS.
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Beyonce doesn’t come up with anything — not the songs, not the “concepts,” not the costumes, not the dance moves. That is all done by others. She is just part of the “product” –a cog in the “Beyonce” money-making machine.
And yes, that song sucks. It is one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard.
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Beyonce has always copied other artists. Check out Raquel Welch, Ann-Margret, etc etc.
But I don’t hold it against her, as long as she does it well.
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People are being stupid. Even if Beyonce did a completely exact replica of the other persons concept, she did an awesome job with it and that’s what mattered. It’s not like she came and said I’m going to perform something that no one has ever thought of before. No. She came and danced and gave the performance of a lifetime. She is amazing.
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Everyone is allowed to be inspired by anything, but when you’re an artist you can’t copy 98% of somebody else’s work. The performances are way too similar! And to be honest, I don’t really find the song (background is not hers either – Diplo & Afrojack own it) is not matching with her performance, with all that geometric stuff. Neither her outfit.
I love drawing/making sketches and I search stuff to inspire me, and sometimes I get so tempted to recreate somebody’s art, but I stop immediately. It’s just stupid. That helps nobody. Especially when you’re famous, you should pay more attention on originality. Or you’ll become Lady Gaga.
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Holy shit. I swear, if you hadn’t explained the ‘comparison’ video (side by side) being from 2 different artists at 2 different performances… I would have thought they were doing a dual performance, all going on at once on the same stage.I’ve not cared for any of the last bunch of songs she’s released, disappointing as she *can* sing.
She really did just rearrange the motions for her performance, as RHONYC pointed out. The moves were still jacked, but maybe they thought people would be less likely to notice (& recognize it) if the moves/images were put in a different order.
I’d certainly not criticize her execution of it, but as praised & lorded over others as she is, I would expect a bit more originality… There’s a difference between ‘Inspired’ & ‘Oh I like that! I’m much better known than that woman, I’ll just use it, no one will even recognize it, I’m sure.“
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wow i cant believe this is the song everyone is talking about.
it sucks.
ps. her fingers are unusually long …
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Nothing to see here, just some more NWO imagery as usual witht these artists.
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Well, it’s always nice to see that the elite’s plans of “dumbing down” the masses is working. Nobody stole anything, she is doing what every other “successful” artist is has to do..what they are told to do. YES, I said what she is told to do! Has no body noticed the alikeness and wierdness of all the music videos and performances? No, because all anyone is paying attention to is the stupid sh**. Wake up people. Seriously. Smh.. P.S. I guess you zombies completely missed the message sent when she said; “My persuasion can build a Nation.”
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she made that video like janet jackson when she makes all those different expressions looking in the mirror i think janet did it in her movie poetic justice she just keep copying off janet and she stole that performance from the italian the 2nd part when she start to dance when she moves her shoulders and the first dance steps she copied that from the africans and the 3rd part at the bottom that target she hit remember the ball janet uses at the end of her solo on feedback ms.janet is the 3rd person she copied all in 1 performance like she always does she doesnt do her own videos or music or have her own style you cant find janet copying none on the internet few people say michael but michael didnt dance sexy after paula and janet went to court and started using their own steps after 15 years janet lasted longer than paula remember janet was an all round dancer tap all that at 7 look at the jackson variety shows all the kids is dancing and check out the steps janet has to keep up with she was cold then
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Cant stand Bey.
WHY can’t the hip hop community come up with their own music, their own Ideas.
Instead of ‘SAMPLING’ others?
I hate rap.
Also, I’m sick of her and JZ’s exhorbitant lifestyle when their “Brothers” and “Sisters” are homeless.
What are they doing for their own community? NADA.. It’s all about Greed and Money….
You can keep it
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