“American Idol” Kelly Clarkson is set to perform at America’s most popular sporting event: the Super Bowl.
Clarkson has been chosen to sing the national anthem before the NFL championship game at Indianapolis on Feb. 5, a person familiar with Super Bowl entertainment plans told The Associated Press on Wednesday.
The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because no announcement has been made. The league is expected to reveal the anthem singer later this month.
Since becoming the first winner of “American Idol” a decade ago, Clarkson has sold more than 20 million albums worldwide and had more than a half-dozen singles reach the top 10 in the Billboard Hot 100.
Among her hit songs: “Since U Been Gone” and “My Life Would Suck Without You.” Her latest album, “Stronger,” was released last year. Clarkson is currently on tour and appeared as the musical guest on “Saturday Night Live” last weekend.
Also slated to participate in the Super Bowl pregame festivities at Lucas Oil Stadium: country music couple Miranda Lambert and Blake Shelton, singing “America the Beautiful.”
Grammy-winner Lambert released her latest album, “Four the Record,” last fall. Shelton is a judge on “The Voice,” a singing competition on NBC, which is broadcasting the Super Bowl this year.
The NFL announced in December that Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee Madonna will perform at halftime of the league’s title game.
At last year’s Super Bowl between the Packers and Steelers in Dallas, pop star Christina Aguilera flubbed a line while belting out the national anthem.
When she was supposed to sing the line “O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming,” Aguilera instead repeated an earlier line, with a slight variation _ drawing plenty of attention on social media such as Twitter.
Afterward, Aguilera released a statement saying: “I can only hope that everyone could feel my love for this country and that the true spirit of its anthem still came through.”
Others who have performed the national anthem at the Super Bowl include Carrie Underwood _ like Clarkson, an “American Idol” product _ Whitney Houston, Billy Joel, Diana Ross, Neil Diamond, Beyonce and Mariah Carey.
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Howard Fendrich is on Twitter at https://twitter.com/HowardFendrich
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