{"id":523792,"date":"2026-06-29T07:43:16","date_gmt":"2026-06-29T07:43:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/523792\/"},"modified":"2026-06-29T07:43:16","modified_gmt":"2026-06-29T07:43:16","slug":"lauyrn-hill-receives-living-legend-icon-award-at-2026-bet-awards","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/523792\/","title":{"rendered":"Lauyrn Hill Receives Living Legend Icon Award at 2026 BET Awards"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tLauryn Hill<\/a> was honored Sunday night (June 28) at the 2026 BET Awards<\/a> as the inaugural recipient of the Living Legend Icon Award.<\/p>\n

\n\tAccording to BET<\/a>, the Living Legend Icon Award celebrates \u201cthe pioneers who mastered their craft and never let go of the culture.\u201d Connie Orlando, EVP of Specials, Music Programming & Music Strategy, called Hill the very definition of a living legend, while further explaining why she\u2019ll be the award\u2019s first honoree. \u201cAcross every era, she has never chased the moment; she has shaped it,\u201d Orlando said. \u201cHer artistry redefined what was possible in our music and gave a generation permission to be fearless, spiritual and free. Her influence is woven into the fabric of the culture, and it is a profound honor to celebrate her legacy on Culture\u2019s Biggest Night.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tThe New Jersey singer, rapper and actress first made a name for herself on the silver screen playing the stubborn but talented student Rita Louise Watson in 1993\u2019s Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit. She then reinforced herself as one-third of the legendary Fugees<\/a> alongside Wyclef Jean<\/a> and Pras Michel<\/a> in 1994 when the group dropped their debut album Blunted on Reality. However, it wasn\u2019t until 1996\u2019s The Score and Ms. Hill\u2019s rendition of Roberta Flack\u2019s \u201cKilling Me Softly With His Song\u201d that she really catapulted to superstardom. She then upped the ante two years later with her seminal debut solo album The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill that forever changed what a hip-hop album could sound like.<\/p>\n

\n\tHer tribute started off with Ice Cube<\/a> setting the table as he broke down her career, which was then followed by her bandmate Wyclef narrating their time with the Fugees. As for the medley, The War and Treaty<\/a> started things off with a callback to Sister Act 2 as they performed \u201cJoyful, Joyful,\u201d originally performed by the fictional St. Francis Choir in the movie; Doechii<\/a> and SZA <\/a>covered \u201cReady or Not\u201d; Tems<\/a> and Tierra Whack<\/a> did \u201cFu-Gee-La\u201d; Lauryn\u2019s daughter Selah Marley performed the title track from her mother\u2019s solo project; Doja Cat<\/a> came out for \u201cSuperstar\u201d; Nas<\/a> did their classic collab \u201cIf I Ruled the World\u201d with Doja; Hill\u2019s son YG Marley<\/a> performed \u201cTurn Your Lights Down Low\u201d; Lizzo<\/a> brought Tierra out again to help her perform \u201cDoo Wap (That Thing)\u201d; her other song Zion Marley did a rendition of a song that\u2019s named after him; Alexia Jayy <\/a>blew the crowd away with her cover of \u201cKilling Me Softly\u201d; and Queen Latifah<\/a> and Common<\/a> ended the tribute with \u201cLost Ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tHill then surprised the crowd and viewers by performing \u201cEx-Factor\u201d before accepting her award.<\/p>\n

\n\tDuring her speech, she explained why she\u2019s so outspoken and encouraged artists to do the same before she congratulated her children on their many accomplishments.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI do this because I love y\u2019all,\u201d the singer began. \u201cI do this because I want you to have everything that I experienced, right? I had wonderful parents who loved on me, poured into me, and protected me. And once I realized that not everybody got to have that experience, I felt like it was my duty, my responsibility to share as much love, and to pour into as much people as I possibly could. And music was a way for me to do that. But also, I had always cared about the expression and the representation of the dignity of our people. So, you know, we put ourselves at times as artists, we put ourselves in places and in situations where we have to say things that aren\u2019t always comfortable. But we understand that people will understand later.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe added: \u201cI fight for y\u2019all. Everybody may not know about it, but I fight for y\u2019all. And fighting for y\u2019all is me fighting for myself, it\u2019s me fighting for my children, it\u2019s me fighting for my parents, it\u2019s me fighting for my grandparents, it\u2019s me fighting for my community. I have a desire to make music as well as I can, or to communicate with people as well as I can because I wan\u2019t people to know that\u2019s what we do. I want people to know what we can do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tFinally, Lauryn ended the show with an emotional performance of \u201cEverything Is Everything\u201d as the credits began to roll.<\/p>\n

\n\tYou can watch her acceptance speech below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lauryn Hill was honored Sunday night (June 28) at the 2026 BET Awards as the inaugural recipient of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523793,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[198191,321,93,1805,28260,61,60,633],"class_list":["post-523792","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-bet-awards","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-genre-hiphop","tag-genre-rb","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523792","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523792"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523792\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}