Tapped to sing the national anthem at the Super Bowl in Dallas on Sunday night, Christina Aguilera flubbed the words – repeating one line of verse and leaving another out.
As she reached the fourth line of the song, which is "O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming," the singer, 30, instead repeated the second line, "What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming."
In fact, she altered the line a bit the second time around, singing, "What so proudly we watched at the twilight's last gleaming."
Many viewers didn't even notice the mistake, but others castigated the singer for the slip-up, calling it embarrassing and disrespectful.
Aguilera released a statement about her performance, telling the Associated Press: "I can only hope that everyone could feel my love for this country and that the true spirit of its anthem still came through."
Yes. If you can't get the words right, you shouldn't be singing it.No. She gave it her all, and one little mistake isn't a big deal.Credit: Tim Nudd for PEOPLE
