Ariana Grande’s performance at the 2020 Grammy Awards proved she’s moving on from all drama — and not just with the list of ex-boyfriends she namechecks in the titular song off her 2019 album thank u, next.
On Sunday, Grande — who is nominated for five awards — performed a medley of her latest album’s hit songs “imagine,” “7 rings,” and “thank u, next.” A small-but-significant change in the final verse of “thank u, next” proves Grande has mended her relationship with her father, Edward Butera.
In the original track, Grande sings:
“One day I'll walk down the aisle/Holding hands with my mama/I'll be thanking my dad/'Cause she grew from the drama.”
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In the version she performed at the Grammys, Grande changes the last line to: “‘I’ll be thanking my dad/’Cause he’s really awesome.”
Grande’s complicated relationship with her father has been well-documented over the years. In 2014, Grande told Seventeen that she had a falling out with her dad the year prior.
“It took me so long to be okay with it,” the singer said of their then-estranged relationship. “The thing that got me there was embracing the fact that that I am made up of half my dad, and a lot of my traits come from him. So much of me comes from my father, and for so long, I didn't like that about myself. I had to accept that it's okay not to get along with somebody and still love them."
In recent years, though, Grande has shared social media posts suggesting that the two are on much better terms. In 2019, she revealed that Butera spent Thanksgiving with her and her mother, Joan Grande. To further solidify that everything is good with Grande and her parents, she brought Joan and Butera to the Grammy Awards as her dates — which means that Butera heard Grande’s lyric change to “thank u, next” live.
It’s TBD whether things are as chill between Grande and her ex-fiancé Pete Davidson: At the end of her Grammys performance, the pop star slid a ring off her finger and placed it back in a box. One public reconciliation at a time, everyone!