Garth Brooks was brought to tears by Kelly Clarkson during her tribute to him at the Kennedy Center Honors ceremony in Washington, D.C.
Brooks is one of several honorees at the 43rd Kennedy Center Honors and during an emotion-filled tribute to the country superstar, Clarkson performed “The Dance,” a performance that brought Brooks to tears alongside his wife Trisha Yearwood.
In a clip shared by PEOPLE, Clarkson is seen performing the hit song while the camera shows Brooks and Yearwood several times, one of which shows the singer tearing up but holding back the tears.
“Could have missed the pain but I would’ve had to miss the dance,” Clarkson sings in the brief clip.
Previously, Brooks appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show where he serenaded Clarkson with a performance of “The Dance,” which brought Clarkson to tears as she admitted that the song is helping her through her divorce from Brandon Blackstock.
“So I’m going through a divorce and there’s been like a lot of books and people always give you stuff to help, especially when you have kids and stuff,” Clarkson previously shared. “And there’s so much shame and guilt. I couldn’t quite nail down the feeling, Like you don’t want to crap on it, like, you don’t want to say that [relationship] doesn’t count or matter, but you don’t know what to put in it because it didn’t work out like you wanted. So, anyway, I kid you not, I was listening to my playlist and ‘The Dance’ came on. And I was like, ‘No, that’s the thing. That’s it.’”
During the episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show, Clarkson also revealed that “The Dance” inspired her to write a song of her own that pays homage to the popular Brooks track, with a special lyric that includes the track’s title. The song will be featured on her upcoming new album.
“It’s not like your song, like a rip-off, but I literally wrote this whole thing therapeutically for me, and it’s actually on my next album,” Clarkson previously told Brooks. “It’s the whole kind of come around…the little tag part is, ‘even though my heart is broken it was worth the dance anyway.’”
Although the honor was awarded live last month, the 2021 Kennedy Center Honors are set to broadcast on Sunday, June 6 at 8 p.m. EST on CBS.
