From Michael Jackson to J-Lo: History of the Super Bowl Half Time Show

The Super Bowl is this Sunday, and fans are excited for the big night. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Kansas City Chiefs will be going head to head for the top spot in the NFL.

Patrick Mahomes and Tom Brady will face off in a clash of generations, but that is not all. The Super Bowl Half Time Show will be performed by RnB kingpin, The Weeknd.

The half time show is a tradition as old as the Super Bowl itself. The tradition started when the first Super Bowl happened in 1967.

However, in its early days, the half time show was only performed by college bands. By the 1970s, the Super Bowl included more ensemble artists as the game became more popular to the masses.

From the 70s all the way to the 90s, the Super Bowl half time show was either a marching band or some ensemble artist that had performed in years past.

However, the NFL saw a decline in viewership during their half-time period. This was because other networks capitalized on the occasion and put together special programming to draw in viewers.

Super Bowl Half Time Show- A big draw for fans

In an effort to compete with these other programs, the NFL started bringing in big-name musicians to perform the half time show.

The first instance of this was in the early 90s when the NFL recruited pop-star Michael Jackson to perform at the show. His performance set the record for television ratings at the time.

Since Jackson’s performance and subsequent success, the NFL started banking on popular artists to perform. Over the past decade or so, the show has become a major attraction for fans, with many non-football fans tuning in to watch the game and the half time performances.

Because of the huge platform provided to artists by the NFL, they do not have to pay the artists to get them to perform. In fact, many artists even volunteer to sponsor the production costs of the half time show in order to secure the slot for themselves.

Many fans are excited to see The Weeknd perform this year. Over the past year, he had one of the most popular songs of all time in ‘Blinding Lights’. Fans will be hoping to see whether his performance lives up to the hype.

But no performance can take away from Brady and the Buccaneers’ showdown against Mahomes and the Chiefs.