Emeli Sandé has revealed that she lost her voice before last night’s (March 29) ‘Concert For Ukraine’ and had to mime her performance.

The two-hour benefit show in Birmingham was held to raise money for the Disasters Emergency Committee‘s (DEC) Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal. Broadcast on ITV, it was expected to raise over £3million, but has already well passed the £10m mark.

Sandé performed ‘Brighter Days’ during the concert, but after the performance many people were suggesting online that the singer mimed the song.

Taking to Twitter this morning (March 30), Sandé confirmed that she was miming due to losing her voice just before the performance.

“Hey everybody, I really hope you enjoyed the ‘Concert For Ukraine’,” she said with a visibly hoarse voice in a video message. “It raised so much money and it was such an important thing for me to be a part of.

“I really wanted to sing, but I woke up the day of the concert and my voice was like this, which is really annoying because the day before I was singing Mariah [Carey] totally fine.”

#ConcertForUkraine pic.twitter.com/c0qjo5W7Ry

— Emeli Sandé (@emelisande) March 30, 2022

She added: “I had to make a very difficult decision: do I pull out of the concert, which I really didn’t want to do, or do I lip-sync to the track? And I chose to lip-sync.

“I’ve never done it in my career ever before, and I never ever will do it again. But for me, it was more important that I got to perform the song with the amazing Kingdom Choir, and that the message of the song came through.”

Sandé concluded: “I apologise to everyone who noticed that it was a lip-sync. I promise that it will never happen again, but I hope that the message of the song still came through.”

During the show, Ed Sheeran and Camila Cabello showcased their collaboration ‘Bam Bam’ for the first time, while Cabello also covered Coldplay‘s 2005 hit single ‘Fix You’.  Sheeran performed his own two-song set with ‘Perfect’ and an acoustic rendition of his Number One hit ‘Bad Habits’.

There were also performances from the likes of Ukraine Eurovision winner Jamala, Anne-Marie, Snow Patrol, Manic Street Preachers, Gregory Porter and Nile Rodgers and Chic.