Harry Styles was forced to “reverse” Grammys performance due to stage malfunction
Harry Styles and his dancers were forced to “reverse” their routine live onstage at the Grammys 2023 after the revolving stage malfunctioned.
The pop star sang his 2022 hit single ‘As It Was’ at the 65th Annual Awards in Los Angeles, California last Sunday (February 5).
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Mirroring the song’s official video, the performance saw Styles appear on a spinning turntable alongside a group of backing dancers. The star also delivered a short choreographed sequence atop the moving platform.
Brandon Mathis, one of the participating dancers, has since taken to Instagram Stories to reveal that all did not go to plan with the performance.
“What you don’t know is that the moment the curtain opened and it was time to perform, our turntable started spinning in reverse,” he explained.
The technical difficulty was the stage spinning the wrong way as soon as they stepped on it
PROFESSIONALS cause they still killed it having to change it right at the last second pic.twitter.com/s9OJaEO808
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Amber
“Backwards. Freaking all of us out on live television, and there was nothing we could do to stop it. So after a week of rehearsing this piece perfectly going this way, the moment it’s time to perform it starts going [the opposite] way.”
Mathis continued: “And in real time, we had to troubleshoot and try to do a complete piece in reverse. Talk about professionalism.”
Choreographer Dexter Da Rocha said that Harry and his team had rehearsed the routine for 10 days prior to the Grammys, “getting down these beautiful formations and sliding off the table in a roll-off and just making this incredible, morphing, cool artistic shit” (via Rolling Stone).
“This whole time we were practicing it with the turntable turning counterclockwise,” he added. “It was difficult and it was frustrating making those patterns while something’s moving and having all this spatial awareness.
“At dress rehearsal, it was gorgeous, it was amazing. We get on stage for the performance, the performance starts and the turntable starts going the wrong way.”
Da Rocha explained: “Harry did his best to walk and reverse everything while he was singing and reverse his entire duet which is incredible.”
Styles won three Grammys at last weekend’s ceremony: Album Of The Year, Best Pop Vocal Album and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical (‘Harry’s House’).
“I’ve been so, so inspired by every artist in this category with me at a lot of different times in my life,” the star said while accepting the Album Of The Year trophy. “I listen to everyone in this category when I’m alone.”
He added: “This doesn’t happen to people like me very often and this is so, so nice. Thank you very much.”
Harry Styles has since received criticism for his latter comment, with some noting his privileged position as a rich, attractive white male.
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Tom Skinner
NME
