Girl Gaga performs throughout her free live performance on Copacabana Seashore in Rio de Janeiro, Saturday, Could 3, 2025.
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RIO DE JANEIRO — Girl Gaga gave a free live performance Saturday night time in entrance of two million followers who poured onto Copacabana Seashore for the most important present of her profession.
“Tonight, we’re making historical past. (…) Thanks for making historical past with me,” Girl Gaga advised a screaming crowd.
The Mom Monster, as she is thought, kicked off the present at round 22:10 p.m. native time together with her 2011 track “Bloody Mary.” Cries of pleasure rose from the tightly-packed followers who sang and danced shoulder-to-shoulder on the huge stretch of sand.
Live performance organizers mentioned 2.1 million individuals attended the present.
Girl Gaga carried out her traditional hits, together with “Poker Face” and “Alejandro,” switching between an array of attire together with one with the colours of the Brazilian flag.
Some followers – a lot of them younger – arrived on the seashore on the first light to safe a great spot, armed with snacks and drinks. They spent the day beneath a blazing solar, whereas others perched in timber, decided to get a panoramic view.
Followers cheer as they watch for the beginning of Girl Gaga’s free live performance on Copacabana seashore in Rio de Janeiro, Saturday, Could 3, 2025.
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“Immediately is the most effective day of my life,” mentioned Manoela Dobes, a 27-year-old designer who was sporting a costume plastered with {a photograph} from when she met Girl Gaga in the US in 2019. “It is surreal to be right here.”
Madonna additionally turned Copacabana Seashore into a large dance flooring final 12 months.
The massive-scale performances are a part of an effort led by Metropolis Corridor to spice up financial exercise after Carnival and New Years’ Eve festivities and the upcoming month-long Saint John’s Day celebrations in June.
“It brings exercise to town throughout what was beforehand thought-about the off-season – filling motels and rising spending in bars, eating places, and retail, producing jobs and earnings for the inhabitants,” mentioned Osmar Lima, town’s secretary of financial improvement, in an announcement launched by Rio Metropolis Corridor’s tourism division final month.
Rio’s Metropolis Corridor mentioned in a latest report that the present ought to inject at the very least 600 million reais (some $106 million) into Rio’s financial system.
Related concert events are scheduled to happen yearly in Could at the very least till 2028.
Girl Gaga arrived in Rio within the early hours of Tuesday. The town has been alive with Gaga-mania since, because it geared as much as welcome the pop star for her first present within the nation since 2012. Rio’s metro staff danced to Girl Gaga’s 2008 hit track “LoveGame” and gave directions for Saturday in a video. A free exhibition celebrating her profession offered out.
Whereas the overwhelming majority of attendees had been from Rio, the occasion additionally attracted Brazilians from throughout the nation and worldwide guests.
Greater than 500,000 vacationers poured into town within the days main as much as the present, greater than double the preliminary forecast, based on knowledge from the native bus station and Tom Jobim airport, Rio’s Metropolis Corridor mentioned in an announcement on Friday.
Followers pack the shore of Copacabana seashore to observe Girl Gaga’s free live performance in Rio de Janeiro, Saturday, Could 3, 2025.
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Bruna Prado/AP
Ingrid Serrano, a 30-year-old engineer, made a cross-continent journey from Colombia to Brazil to attend the present.
“I have been a 100% fan of Girl Gaga my entire life,” mentioned Serrano, who was sporting a T-shirt that includes Girl Gaga’s outlandish costumes through the years.
For her, the mega-star represents “whole freedom of expression – being who one desires with out disgrace.”
Rio officers have a historical past of organizing big concert events on Copacabana Seashore. Madonna’s present drew an estimated 1.6 million followers final 12 months, whereas 4 million individuals flooded onto the seashore for a 1994 New Yr’s Eve present by Rod Stewart in 1994. In keeping with Guinness World Data, that was the most important free rock live performance in historical past.
To make sure followers might hear the songs, sixteen sound towers had been unfold alongside the seashore.
Rio state’s safety plan included the presence of three,300 army and 1,500 law enforcement officials, and 400 army firefighters.
Amongst these current had been Girl Gaga admirers who bear in mind their disappointment in 2017, when the artist canceled a efficiency scheduled in Rio on the final minute on account of well being points.
Ricardo Filho, who has been a fan since childhood, mentioned it was definitely worth the wait.
“She’s the most effective artist on the planet,” the 25-year-old mentioned, as chants of “Gaga, I like you” in Portuguese rose from the gang behind him.
