Beyoncé’s Coachella set breaks YouTube viewing record

Beyoncé’s awe-inspiring critically acclaimed set at the first weekend of the Coachella festival in Palm Springs, California, has set a new viewing record for YouTube.

Many of the acts playing on Saturday April 14, including Vance Joy, were streamed to 232 countries, generating 41 million live views.

The Australian stream was through Optus.

Queen Bey’s show was watched simultaneously by 458,000 people which according to YouTube was the highest watched Coachella performance of all time, and most viewed live music festival on the platform.

The newly created buzz word of the day, “Beychella”, received 2.2 million times on Twitter.

Beyoncé pulled out all stops to make her appearance a memorable one.

She brought on husband JAY-Z and sister Solange, had a troupe of dancers and a 200-person marching band throughout, and instituted a Destiny’s Child reunion with Kelly Rowland and Michelle Williams on their ‘90s hits ‘Say My Name’, ‘Soldier’ and ‘Lose My Breath’.

At the start of the set, she said, “Thank you Coachella for allowing me to be the first black woman to headline.”

She then launched into ‘Run the World (Girls)’.

The set was a tribute to sisterhood, diversity, pioneers, courage and the beauty of blackness.

This included a tribute to Nina Simone via ‘Lilac Wine’ quoted civil rights campaigner Malcolm X, paid homage to African musician and activist Fela Kuti, and got the crowd to join in on the black anthem ‘Lift Every Voice and Sing’ and sampled ‘Swag Surfin’’ by F.L.Y. which is also an anthem on African American campuses at sports meets and graduation ceremonies.

She told the crowd, “I was supposed to perform at Coachella before (in 2017) but I ended up getting pregnant.

“I had time to dream with two beautiful souls in my belly and this this is everything I dreamed of and more.

“I hope y’all enjoyed the show, we worked very hard.”

She announced that her BeyGOOD program would $25,000 scholarships for black students studying literature, creative arts, African American studies, science, education, business, communications, social sciences, computer science or engineering.

Beyoncé will play Coachella again this weekend, which will see if she breaks her own viewing figures.