Blackbird’s flown: Beyoncé’s “BLACKBIIRD” and the legacy of a poem

The “Blackbird” rendition inducts Beyoncé into a long line of Black musicians who have made the song their own

I think Beyoncés cover of blackbird has the potential to alter my brain chemistry 

As the second song on the highly anticipated Cowboy Carter, Beyoncé’s cover of the Beatles song “Blackbird” sent heads rolling as soon as the tracklist was revealed. In the two weeks since its release, “BLACKBIIRD” has pushed the envelope as a cover. With featured artists and a wide audience, the song has platformed emerging Black artists of the present while elevating Black histories of the past. By sharing the history of a Black story in a white band’s hit, “BLACKBIIRD” has the potential to bring listeners to the Black musicians who recognized the struggle in the song and brought their voices to it, even just two years after the Beatles' original. 

Shortly after Beyoncé announced Cowboy Carter’s tracklist, the BeyHive and greater music community quickly took to socials—see TikTok—to relish in Beyoncé covering a Beatles song, and for many, it seemed Beyoncé’s inclusion of the 1968 track introduced them to the history behind its lyrical messaging. And for those of you who don’t know, allow me to introduce you.

Famously, Paul McCartney wrote “Blackbird” as a response to the U.S. civil rights movement in the ’60s and the young women in the Little Rock Nine. In his book The Lyrics, McCartney shares that “Blackbird” was written a mere weeks after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968. “That imagery of the broken wings and the sunken eyes and the general longing for freedom is very much of its moment,” McCartney wrote. It was specifically the rageful and vitriolic response to Black youth and the racial integration of education in many parts of America that moved McCartney to write “Blackbird.” In 2016, he met two of the Little Rock Nine. And with “blackbird” meant to translate to “Black girl” (“bird” being English slang for “girl” at the time), Beyoncé singing the track, joined by four Black female country artists, was a homecoming of sorts for the lyrics. 

If you’ve read anything I’ve written for b*tchfork, you know I’m a bit of a music history fan. But “BLACKBIIRD” goes beyond bringing this slice of the past to a much broader audience––it introduces up-and-coming Black country musicians Brittney Spencer, Reyna Roberts, Tanner Adell, and Tiera Kennedy to a massive new audience. The cover also honors the history of McCartney’s composition by staying faithful to its arrangement and allowing the lyrics to shine. “BLACKBIIRD” is doing what music released by a mega-star can do best: elevate, expose, and, of course, entertain. 

“BLACKBIIRD” has incredible potential within the context of musical legacies. The song is singular on Cowboy Carter as a complete and straightforward cover, and the reaction to “BLACKBIIRD” animates the impact a cover can have. When done right, a cover of a song illuminates the lasting relevance of its lyrics and elevates a song to timelessness. Beyoncé is the kind of once-in-a-generation artist whose projects have the power to alter a music ecosystem—she already has—and “BLACKBIIRD” is emblematic of how her sphere of influence ensures her music does transformative work. Beyoncé is not the first Black woman to make “Blackbird” her own, but by releasing this cover and starting a conversation, “BLACKBIIRD” can highlight an otherwise largely-unknown history of Black musicians. “BLACKBIIRD” advances Beyoncé’s legacy and lights a fire under those of emerging artists, while also guiding listeners to the legacies of Black musicians who came before. 

Legacy is critical to the concept masterpiece that is Cowboy Carter. In “16 CARRIAGES,” Beyoncé sings about leaving her home behind for the sake of a legacy: “if it’s the last thing I do / you’ll remember me.” Through the featured veteran artists, Beyoncé honors the legacy of the country genre, and lyrically pulls on legacy through themes of place and family. Is “BLACKBIIRD” a historic, beautiful full-circle moment for a poem rooted in the history of Black women? To quote a new song I don’t like that much: yes, and it’s also more. 

We must give the women on “BLACKBIIRD” their flowers. The five voices on “BLACKBIIRD” are absolutely angelic and blend like they were always meant to be together. Brittney Spencer, Reyna Roberts, Tanner Adell, and Tiera Kennedy—a Fab Four in their own right complete with matching tattoos—are all new country artists with debut albums that, for most, are barely a year old. Baltimore-born Spencer released her debut album My Stupid Life only a few months ago, and its lead single name-drops musical icons, including Queen B herself: “you should know you're gonna want a little bit more / To put your love on top like Beyoncé.” Tanner Addell’s title track on her 2023 debut album Buckle Bunny does the same, as the country-pop darling describes herself as “lookin’ like Beyoncé with a lasso.” Reyna Roberts’s debut album Bad Girl Bible Vol. 1 dropped in September last year, and Tiera Kennedy has only released singles and a self-titled EP. (I am kinda digging the rock country thing Kennedy has got on her latest single, “Jesus, My Mama, My Therapist,” and the TikTok video of her reacting to hearing herself on “BLACKBIIRD” is too sweet not to watch.) 

By including Spencer, Roberts, Adell, and Kennedy on what could’ve easily been a solo venture, Beyoncé helped catapult the careers of Black country artists while issuing a “fuck you” to anyone who’s breathed a word against their place in the genre. Spotify News posted on April 4 that the featured artists on “BLACKBIIRD” saw dramatic increases in first-time listeners on Spotify: Spencer saw a 170% increase in new listeners, Adell 125%, Roberts 125%, and Kennedy 110%. On April 5 Billboard shared photos of a billboard in L.A. listing those artists along with Shaboozey and Willie Jones, accompanied by another billboard reading: “HATS OFF TO THE TRAILBLAZERS FEATURED ON COWBOY CARTER.” If this was all “BLACKBIIRD” did, I think including it on Cowboy Carter would have been more than worth it. The fact that it’s become a 20th-century music history lesson is a bonus.

I am an unabashed Beatles fanatic; The band has been one of my top five artists ever since Spotify Wrapped started in 2016, and “Blackbird” was my number-one song in 2021. 

And to be a true fan of the Beatles, and rock music in general, is to understand that Black musicians have always been at the heart of the genre. McCartney and John Lennon’s biggest inspirations were Black American musical icons—Chuck Berry in particular, who also made it to Cowboy Carter with Beyoncé’s shortened take on Berry’s “Oh Louisiana”—as well as the Black musicians they saw growing up in Liverpool. The narrative parallels between white and Black rock musicians in feature films like Elvis (2022) represent what has been a slow, overdue, and often inadequate collective reckoning with the racial history of rock and roll and how the Black artists who nurtured the form were, and often remain, consistently sidelined. The same is true in country music and folk¹; the legacy of Black musicians in these spaces has, more often than not, been unsung. With Cowboy Carter, Beyoncé takes a swing at this cultural and industry-driven injustice, and her cover of “Blackbird” takes a stand for Black rock and country musicians alike by elevating Black history.

On April 4, McCartney took to Instagram to share his excitement over Beyoncé’s cover and his hopes for the song’s impact today. After praising Beyoncé’s version and its reinforcement of the messaging that moved him to write it in the first place, McCartney wrote:

 “When I saw the footage on the television in the early 60s of the black girls being turned away from school, I found it shocking and I can’t believe that still in these days there are places where this kind of thing is happening right now. Anything my song and Beyoncé’s fabulous version can do to ease racial tension would be a great thing and makes me very proud.”

To repurpose and reinvent sounds via covers and sampling only proves the interconnectedness of the form, and how, as I will continue to say for as long as I live, music grows in and around each other, and no song exists without another. As a Beatles fan—a task which is often full of mourning—what’s so touching about “BLACKBIIRD” is that McCartney is still alive to see his poem revived into a new life, and found that the message penned almost 60 years ago was still universal. 

All this being said, the most compelling part about Beyoncé’s inclusion of “BLACKBIIRD” is not that now more people know a Beatles song is about young Black women in the ’60s. With “Now and Then” and the Sam Mendes biopics recently announced, the Beatles don’t exactly need more press. The most compelling aspect of “BLACKBIIRD” is not just that it amplifies the voices of young, Black country singers but that the cover builds on a legacy of Black musicians who have released their own renditions of “Blackbird” since it came out. Just as Cowboy Carter sparked a reckoning with the real history of Black cowboys and country musicians, Beyoncé reminds us that embedded in a song by one of the most popular white rock acts in the history of music is the legacy of Black musicians. “BLACKBIIRD” not only formally inducts Beyoncé into this rich history, but it also brings the following artists and their stories to the forefront of music appreciation. Inspired by the thread of legacy woven throughout Cowboy Carter, I want to take the moment “BLACKBIIRD” has graciously given us to spotlight eight potentially lesser-known covers. 

Sisters Love (1970)

The first “Blackbird” cover I’d like to highlight is my favorite and from the ’60s funk and soul group, Sisters Love.² Per Discogs, Sisters Love released their cover on the B-side of a single in 1970—just two years after the original. In my humble opinion, it’s impossible not to love. And listening to the lead vocals on this track, I have to believe Janis Joplin was a Sisters Love fan. 

Billy Preston (1972)

It feels like cheating to include Billy Preston here because he is far from “lesser known.”³ Like Sisters Love, Preston released “Blackbird” on the B-side of an A&M single. While Sisters Love (beautifully) rips their way through the track, Preston’s arrangement follows a similar pacing but is a bit softer and groovier. Released four years after the original, Preston’s version fitted “Blackbird” to a classic funk ’70s sound. 

Roslyn Sweat & The Paragons (1973)

In an entirely different tune, Roslyn Sweat & The Paragons⁴, a Jamaican ska group, released a reggae cover called “Black Birds Singing” in 1973. This may be one of my favorite unexpected finds because I would’ve never guessed a reggae rock-steady rendition of “Blackbird” existed.

Sarah Vaughan (1981)

With jazz vocalist and pianist Sarah Vaughan’s cover of “Blackbird,” we’ve entered the jazz-adjacent portion of this run-down. Vaughan sang the track on her album Songs of the Beatles (1981), and it keeps the iconic guitar pattern before shaking up the traditional cover with a funk break between verses. What I love about this particular cover is how it tricks you, just for a second, into thinking it’s a straight-forward cover before Vaughan makes the arrangement hers.⁵ 

Bobby McFerrin (1984)

Another jazz-influenced singer-songwriter and expert vocalist, Bobby McFerrin, recorded an eclectic “Blackbird” in 1984. McFerrin⁶ is well-known for his improvisational vocal experimentations and his mastered vocal technique is especially evident in his “Blackbird.” We are not meant to throw around the words “authentic” and “original” in music writing, but you have to admit that you’ve likely never heard a version of “Blackbird” quite like this one. 

Dionne Farris (1994)

Dionne Farris, the R&B and hip-hop singer-songwriter, released a laid-back and stripped-down rendition of “Blackbird” in the ’90s. ⁷Farris shimmers on her “Blackbird,” and I adore how she took the song and let her voice glisten with it. The guitar is also very cool.  

Herbie Hancock and Corinne Bailey Rae (2010)

Jazz legend Herbie Hancock and vocalist Corinne Bailey Rae performed “Blackbird” at the White House at a 2010 tribute concert for Paul McCartney. Their rendition is a beautiful one and worth opening up YouTube once again for. Bailey Rae is transcendent, and Hancock’s piano is gorgeous (especially his riff just over halfway through the performance).⁸ 

Bettye LaVette (2020)

To round out our non-exhaustive list⁹, we have Bettye LaVette’s “Blackbird.” One of her most recent studio albums, Blackbirds (2020), was inspired by hearing McCartney’s “Blackbird” for the first time later in life. LaVette performed the song at the 2010 Beatles concert after her husband suggested it and played it for her. LaVette recalled in an interview that upon first hearing “Blackbird,” she thought, “I wonder if people know he’s talking about a Black woman?” Blackbirds closes on a “Blackbird” shifted to first-person and is otherwise full of songs originally popularized by Black women, including “Strange Fruit.”¹⁰ 

---

Throughout Cowboy Carter, Beyoncé pays tribute as much as she reinvents and charts a path only she can take. She makes her cover of Dolly P’s “Jolene” entirely her own, and reinterprets classics like “These Boots Are Made For Walkin’” and “Good Vibrations” on “YA YA.” These beautiful interpolations and manipulations of other songs make “BLACKBIIRD” stand out on the album; Beyoncé left the lyrics untouched and made the act of singing it with four other Black, female, country artists speak for itself. 

By elevating artists past and present, “BLACKBIIRD” gets at the heart of what a cover can add to an album and an artist’s musical legacy. The rendition has already skyrocketed the exposure of its featured artists, giving the modern-day trailblazers of Black artists making country music a place at the table. The trailblazers who came before Beyoncé, those featured on the album like Linda Martell and those listed above, have a place in this conversation of legacies, too; Their stories are woven into the history and sounds of “BLACKBIIRD.” As what is arguably the thematic crux of Cowboy Carter, it is essential we do not forget to honor the legacies of musicians who made an album, and a cover, like this possible. By explicitly acknowledging the Sisters Love and Sarah Vaughans of music history, we acknowledge the genre-bending work and sharing that built the mountain Beyoncé stands on today.

After all, imitation is the highest form of flattery.

1. I would be remiss not to give my friends at Folkways Recordings a shout-out when talking about Black folk and country music. Dom Flemons, a Folkways artist who was featured in the New York Times piece about Black folk musicians, recently put together a playlist of Black country artists on the label. Give it a listen, it’s amazing.

2. Sisters Love was founded in 1968 and was made up of former members of The Raelettes, who were Ray Charles’s female backing ensemble. Sisters Love found success with A&M and later the Motown subsidiary MoWest, but their 1972 album With Love was put on hold when the group disbanded in 1973. With Love was later released in 2010.

3. Though known by many for his part in the Beatles’ “Get Back,” Preston was an iconic session keyboardist and musician in his own right—I wrote about Preston in an LWT installation back in November.

4. Think you don’t know The Paragons? Think again! Their 1967 hit “Tide is High,” penned by bandmate John Holt, was catapulted into international popularity when Blondie famously covered it in the ’80s. After Holt left the trio for a solo career in 1970, the remaining Paragons were joined by singer Roslyn Sweat, who joined them on this delightful cover.

5. Vaughan’s discography is extensive: her debut studio album was released in 1950, and she’s recorded nearly 50 studio albums, 10 live albums, 35 compilation albums, and even more with extended editions, box sets, and appearances. Her voice manages to fill a song and lilt between lyrics simultaneously. Vaughan’s “Misty” is stunning. Watch her perform it live here. 

6. À la The Paragons, even if you don’t think you know Bobby McFerrin, you do. He originated “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” which won McFerrin three Grammys. McFerrin also still performs to this day, which is always a treat to discover.

7. This cover was included on Farris’s debut album Wild Seed – Wild Flower (1994), which produced her hit single “I Know.” Farris performed “I Know” when she was a musical guest on Saturday Night Live in 1995, and for her second song, performed her acoustic “Blackbird.” (If anyone can find that video, please share it with me).

8. Hancock and Bailey Rae have a bit of musical history together; Bailey Rae won her first Grammy for her work as a featured artist on Hancock’s 2008 Album of the Year winner River: The Joni Letters (2007). River is also Hancock’s first (and only) Album of the Year win.

9. Jon Batiste is probably too famous for this list. Watch his gorgeous 2016 rendition here. No one does it like Mr. Batiste!

10. Though LaVette released her first single in 1962 at the age of 16, she didn’t break through to mainstream audiences until 2005 with I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise. The soul and blues singer blends funk, rock, gospel, and country into her sound, and in 2020 was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame.

COVER IMAGE CREDIT: Featured images courtesy of Beyoncé Press, photos by Mason Poole, copyright Parkwood Entertainment LLC.