Kanye West and the Sunday Service Choir paid tribute to DMX with live performances at the late rapper’s Celebration of Life memorial service in Brooklyn on Saturday. Wearing red hooded sweatshirts, the gospel group opened the service at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center with an arrangement of Soul II Soul’s ‘Keep On Movin’. They then sang the Clark Sisters’ ‘You Brought The Sunshine’, the hymn ‘Jesus Loves Me’ and their original song ‘Excellent’, all in honor of DMX.
Other prominent guests at the service were members of the hip-hop collective and record label Ruff Ryders as well as Nas, Swizz Beats, and more. The memorial service, which was live-streamed on DMX’s YouTube and Instagram accounts, began with a video of DMX and his daughter riding a rollercoaster. DMX can be heard comforting his daughter, saying, “It’s okay, daddy’s here.”
A clip of DMX performing a spoken-word poem subsequently appeared on the screen. “I fear that what I’m saying won’t be heard until I’m gone/ But it’s all good because I didn’t really expect to live long,” DMX says. “So if it takes for me to suffer for my brother to see the light/ Give me pain til I die/ But please lord treat him right.”
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Ahead of the service, DMX’s casket was driven to the Barclays Center on top of a Ruff Ryders monster truck with “Long live DMX” painted on the side. Hundreds of bikers led the funeral procession from DMX’s birthplace of Yonkers to Brooklyn’s Barclays Center.
DMX, born Earl Simmons, died on April 9 at age 50 after suffering a heart attack. His private funeral and homegoing celebration will be held on Sunday at 2:30 pm ET, and will air live on BET and its YouTube channel.
Watch Kanye West and the Sunday Service Choir perform:
