As the nation gathered to watch the many inaugural events taking place in the nation’s capital, a performance at the Lincoln Memorial served as a somber reminder of the many lives lost as a result of the pandemic but that help is on the way.
Detroit registered nurse Lori Marie Key performed a moving rendition of “Amazing Grace” at the memorial event organized as a way to honor the more than 400,0000 lives lost to coronavirus.
On Tuesday evening, soon-to-be President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris stared out from the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., as Key sang the beloved hymn.
Key actually went viral earlier this year when she was recorded singing “Amazing Grace” to her colleagues at a Michigan hospital amid the pandemic.
In an interview with Huffington Post, Key explained, “Working as a COVID nurse was heartbreaking,” Key said at the sunset memorial service. “But when I’m at work, I sing. It gives me strength during difficult times, and I believe it helps heal.”The memorial event, put on by the Biden-Harris transition team, was a reminder of the Americans who have died in less
than a year as a result of coronavirus, and a symbolic gesture to Americans that the Biden-Harris administration is committed to taking action in the fight against COVID.At the event Harris told the crowd, “For many months, we have grieved by ourselves. Tonight we grieve and begin healing together.”
Before Key’s performance, Biden thanked her and went on to say, “if there are any angels in heaven, they’re all nurses. We know from our family experience what you do: the courage, the pain you absorb for others,” Biden said. “So thank you.”
Honoring the hundreds of thousands who have perished, funeral bells at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., rang out 400 times, in tribute to the more than 400,000 dead from COVID-19 in the U.S.