Alicia Keys had been dying to host a masquerade ball, but she had no clue what or when the right occasion would be. Then, it came to her: her Holiday Masquerade Ball will air December 21 at 7 p.m. PT on Apple Music and Apple Music’s TikTok page.
Speaking to Apple Music 1’s Ebro Darden, Alicia explained her desire to throw a ball.
“I was so young from the beginning [of my career] that there’s a lot of things I haven’t done. And one of those things I haven’t done is a masquerade ball,” she said.
Alicia had also never recorded a holiday album, hence her recently released Santa Baby.
“It just feels like there’s such a classic-ness to [a holiday album]. There’s such a timelessness to it,” she said. “I want to be a part of those greats, of those ones that you play every year, all the time. You love it. That’s why I wanted to create brand new classics, and honor the originals and the timeless ones.”
The masquerade ball will see Alicia perform those records, as well as some of her career hits. She said the event looks a lot different than her previous shows.
“If you’ve been to the tour, you never seen this before. You just haven’t. And so every arrangement is going to be different and new, and it’s going to definitely bring us into the spirit, the festivity,” she said. “You have to get dressed and you have to have a mask. This is happening. This is an event. I’m calling it Glitter and Glamour.”
“You’re bringing your elegance, but there’s no specific way that that exactly looks,” she continued. “But you do want to get dressed. You want to put on. You got to light up the place.”
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