The 2016 BET Awards celebration started off with the red carpet experience. We saw a lot of beautiful women with sheer cleavage (pun intended). Most notably singers Toni Braxton, Tinashe and Remy Ma had on a black sheer outfit, with a bikini underneath (Remy performed in hers later that night). The best-dressed female was Letoya Luckett with a beautiful, sexy and classy red dress with an exposed back. The pre-show took careful inventory of every outfit last night – thanks to the creative Covergirl booth. The booth used an automated camera (or what looked like an iPad) rotating around the celebs in 360 degrees, showing off every detail of their clothing and style.

Toni Braxton / Tinashe / Remy Ma

Toni Braxton / Tinashe / Remy Ma

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LeToya Luckett / BET

Celebs continued coming in as hosts of the pre-show – Terrance J, Rocsi Diaz (both former hosts of 106 and Park) and Ray J asked every celeb, “What are you most looking forward to tonight?” and unanimously (since we stopped counting) people answered, “the Prince tribute”. The tribute performances (or Prince celebration) quickly became the most anticipated portion of the award show – after BET tweeted some “mad shade” to the Billboard Awards after their Prince tribute, featuring Madonna singing “Nothing Compares To You” and “Purple Rain” with Stevie Wonder.

During the pre-show rumors circulated about who is opening the show. Perhaps our biggest clue was an appearance by Beyonce’s dancers, as they got into “Formation” on the red carpet. Each dancer dressed in high fashion threads and lined up in military order. Every one of her dancers looked great – clearly being down with Bey, not only gets you prime entrance into award shows around the world but the best clothes money can buy.  Still, at this point, no one could confirm whether or not Beyonce was in the building or performing at all for that matter – since she’s starting a tour in England right now.

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Beyonce’s “Formation” Dancers / BET Awards

The pre-show ended and our suspicions were confirmed, Beyonce opened the show with the song “Freedom”. Smoke raised up from the back of the auditorium, as Beyonce’s dancers entered through the aisles in some sort of tribal paint and formation. Eventually reaching the stage and dancing around Beyonce in a shallow pool of water extending the full length of the stage. The performance hit overdrive as Kendrick Lamar (who opened the show last year in 2015 with “Alright”) elevated through the floor. This was one of the best openers I’ve seen in a long time and proves why Beyonce is on legendary status right now. Her dedication to BET and the ongoing support was surprising, as we later find out, while accepting her daughter’s award for video of the year, Tina Knowles explain that Bey left on a plane to England for a show starting the next day. Beyonce appeared to have squeezed the BET Awards into her hectic schedule, so thank you Beyonce.

The show was hosted by the stars of the show Black-ish, Anthony Anderson and Tracee Ellis Ross, performed their opening monologue or a “gentle arrangement” as said by Tracee Ellis Ross, as they sang songs from today in the style of Hamilton dressed in late century clothing. They performed Desiigners’ “Panda”, O.T. Genasis’ “Cut It”, The Weeknd‘s’ “I Can’t Feel My Face” and Rihanna‘s “Sex With Me” ending the funny opener with Anthony Hamilton and his musket singing “Coming From Where I’m From”. The hosts were very funny, especially after Janelle Monae performed her tribute to Prince in the famous “butt out” pants, host Anthony Anderson joined in the fun wearing a pair of his own “butt out” pants.

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Tracee Ellis Ross / Anthony Hamilton / Anthony Anderson

The most anticipated part of the show finally came with a performance by The Roots (backing up everyone’s tribute throughout the night), Erykah Badu and Bilal. Erykah Badu sang a silky, smooth version of “The Ballad of Dorothy Parker”, which is a great song choice for Erykah’s style as a neo-soul artist; Erykah should really consider releasing her own version of the song because it fits her so well. I’m not sure if all of the viewers knew the song since the song is popular amongst deeper Prince fans. Bilal sang “The Beautiful Ones” off of Prince’s most prolific album Purple Rain – rolling all around the floor screaming “I WANT YOU!”. Bilal came out of nowhere and was definitely a standout performer. I was happy to find out that the songs chosen throughout the night, were not the typical songs you would expect from a Prince tribute. Songs like “When Doves Cry”, “1999” or “Purple Rain” (sang later on in the night by Jennifer Hudson) are the normal songs played and I think this celebration appealed to Princes’ deeper fanbase since he’s had more albums and songs other than Purple Rain. Later on, Stevie Wonder and Tori Kelly had a duet over “Take Me With You” and Jennifer Hudson took “Purple Rain” to church – just phenomenal vocals from J. Hud. Other artists like Maxwell sang “Lake By The Ocean”, under an umbrella and rainfall (there was plenty of fire and water effects throughout the night) then went into “Nothing Compares 2 U”. Janelle Monae lent her voice to songs like “Delirious”, “Kiss”, “Pop Life” and “I Would Die 4 U” wearing clothes reminiscent of what Prince wore on tour and in iconic music videos. The finale of the show featured Sheila E. doing a medley of “Housequake” with Prince’s ex-wife, professional dancer, Mayte Garcia dancing to the music ,”Erotic City”, “Let’s Work”, “U Got The Look”, “Love Bizarre”, “Glamorous Life”, “America” and “Baby I’m A Star” with moves from Jerome Benton (the sidekick/partner from Morris Day and The Time).

Later on, Stevie Wonder and Tori Kelly had a duet over “Take Me With You” and Jennifer Hudson took “Purple Rain” to church – just phenomenal vocals from J. Hud. Other artists like Maxwell sang “Lake By The Ocean”, under an umbrella and rainfall (there was plenty of fire and water effects throughout the night) then went into “Nothing Compares 2 U”. Janelle Monae lent her voice to songs like “Delirious”, “Kiss”, “Pop Life” and “I Would Die 4 U” wearing clothes reminiscent of what Prince wore on tour and in iconic music videos. The finale of the show featured Sheila E. doing a medley of “Housequake” with Prince’s ex-wife, professional dancer, Mayte Garcia dancing to the music ,”Erotic City”, “Let’s Work”, “U Got The Look”, “Love Bizarre”, “Glamorous Life”, “America” and “Baby I’m A Star” with moves from Jerome Benton (the sidekick/partner from Morris Day and The Time).

BET’s flagship award show had plenty of high moments with Jesse Williams‘ acceptance speech for the Humanitarian Award and Samuel L. Jackson‘s Lifetime Achievement Award. The regular performers were French Montana, Fat Joe and Remy Ma on “I’m All The Way Up” and Bryson Tiller, who is really on the rise with “Exchange”). Lastly, Anderson Paak performed “Come Down” which was filled with high energy and brought him much needed attention – he could very well be music’s new cornerstone – bringing something new to the game. This year’s show was the best in a long time (honestly, though – last year’s show was pretty good too – but this one was better).  I’m really looking forward to seeing how other awards shows will compare to BET’s Prince celebration after setting the bar so high.