I’m not crying, you’re crying. In the case of Celine Dion and Kelly Clarkson, both things can be true. On Tuesday (Oct. 8) Dion posted a tear-stained video of her reaction to Clarkson’s moving Kellyoke cover of Celine’s iconic 1997 Titanic ballad “My Heart Will Go On” on the singer’s daytime talk show last month.
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“I just saw you singing ‘My Heart Will Go On,’ and I’m crying again,” the Canadian star said in the clip where she was seen wiping away tears. “You were absolutely incredible, fantastic. I loved it so much. I hope we can see each other in person soon.”
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“So, I got this video sent to me and and it all flooded… I was working with Jason [Halbert] my musical director here at the show… we were actually doing stuff for Kellyokes, and all of a sudden I get this thing from my manager and I cried,” Clarkson said while describing her reaction to Dion’s high praise in a two-minute video posted Tuesday night from what looks like her dressing room.
“Because it was Celine Dion saying that she saw my performance and she knows my name,” Clarkson, 42, explained with a beaming cat-swallowed-the-canary smile while casually swinging her arms and throwing an aw shucks look up at the ceiling. “So that’s cool.” Clarkson then rolled the Dion video and said that it blew her away, adding that there was one thing in particular that made the compliment extra special.
“Twenty-two years ago on American Idol I got laryngitis,” the OG Idol winner recalled, noting that everyone got sick at the time and despite her vocal struggles she had to take the stage to belt Dion’s equally challenging 2002 ballad “I Surrender All.”
“I bawled that night because I’m just mortified that Celine Dion is going to see this performance,” Clarkson, who was 19 at the time, said of her impressive take on the song, delivered while wearing an asymmetrical, one-strap black dress and bejeweled choker. “I could have cared less about votes at that point. I just didn’t want to see Celine Dion see or hear this because it was so bad, because I was so sick.”
Cut to 22 years later, and Clarkson said she finally got the Celine performance she’d always wanted. “And I felt like I sang it all right, you know?” she said. “I got to honor someone who is such a hero to me, vocally, like she is one of my main inspirations of why I’m a singer.” Clarkson said she’ll probably watch the video over-and-over, while also not-so-low-key, inviting Dion to come visit her on her show. “Like, I can quit now in life,” she gushed about checking off the ultimate career bucket list item.
Along with the video posted on X, Clarkson wrote, “@celinedion you have no idea how much you even noticing my existence means to me! Thank you so much for being such an amazing example of true passion and being one of the greatest vocalists of all time that I am still, to this day, inspired by [heart emoji].”
Check out Clarkson’s video below.