As one particularly insightful Saturday Night Live skit showed the world this year, there’s a special kind of devotion that comes with being a fan of Beyoncé. Viewing people’s reports of “Queen Bey” and Jay-Z‘s recent On the Run Tour over social media, one might get the impression that seeing Beyoncé live is some kind of religious experience. One might think, then, that taking on the task of covering this world-renowned artist to be a daunting task.
Fortunately, an especially talented songwriter has taken up the challenge. Sofia, a London-born musician now based in New York City, has taken on interpreting Beyoncé, performing a stripped-down version of “Partition” off of last year’s Beyoncé. A Berkelee College of Music grad, Sofia’s musical chops are not in question; based on her choices in covering “Partition”, neither is her ability to put inspired spins on the work of other artists.
Her stripped-down, acoustic, and Auto-Tune accented rendition of “Partition” adds a darker dimension to the sexually aggressive lyrical passages, and her yearning vocal in the chorus adds vulnerability to the song.