The View hosts defend Lizzo's performance with James Madison's 200-year-old crystal flute

Joey Nolfi
·2 min read
The View hosts defend Lizzo's performance with James Madison's 200-year-old crystal flute

Lizzo's discography is literally music to the world's ears — but the singer's recent Washington, D.C. concert struck the wrong chord with certain critics, some of whom slammed the artist for playing a 200-year-old crystal flute that belonged to former U.S. President James Madison.

The ladies of The View, however, came to Lizzo's defense on Friday's episode of the long-running talk show. New conservative cohost Alyssa Farah Griffin asserted that Lizzo's set brought "attention to history," while Ana Navarro reminded the audience that Lizzo is a "classically trained" flautist with deep experience in the performing arts.

Sunny Hostin noted that Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden asked Lizzo to visit the government's collection of roughly 1,700 flutes on Monday before allowing her to perform with Madison's instrument Tuesday night.

Lizzo
Lizzo

Shawn Miller/Library of Congress Lizzo playing a flute at the Library of Congress.

"She invited Lizzo to come and do this, and that makes it history," Hostin said. "Then you have some people on the right who said that the Library of Congress really took out its 200-year-old flute that belonged to James Madison just so Lizzo could twerk with it [and that would] degrade our history."

"Well," she continued, "James Madison owned 100 slaves — that's a degradation of history. It's a full-circle moment for American history… This is the promise of America: You have a slave's ancestor playing the 200-year-old flute."

At the show, Lizzo performed a quick medley with the crystal flute, and later celebrated becoming the first person to play it.

"NOBODY HAS EVER HEARD THIS FAMOUS CRYSTAL FLUTE BEFORE. NOW YOU HAVE," Lizzo tweeted after the concert, during which she used the historic instrument that was given to Madison by a Parisian watchmaker, Claude Laurent, in the early 1800s.

The "About Damn Time" singer's visit to the Library of Congress earlier this week also included a performance, as the Library's social media accounts shared video of Lizzo playing notes inside the Great Hall and Main Reading Room while researchers — who assured audiences that the instruments could be played without ruining the preservation process — watched.

See Lizzo perform with Madison's flute above.

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