Garth Brooks Nearly Lost It Watching Kelly Clarkson's Moving Rendition of "The Dance"

Garth Brooks Nearly Lost It Watching Kelly Clarkson's Moving Rendition of "The Dance"
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Garth Brooks held back his tears at the 43rd Annual Kennedy Center Honors.

As one of this year's honorees — alongside Debbie Allen, Joan Baez, Midori and Dick Van Dyke — the Grammy-winning country artist sat front row during the awards ceremony in Washington D.C. and enjoyed a special performance of his 1990 song "The Dance," sung by The Voice coach and talk show host Kelly Clarkson.

In a preview clip of the performance, which you can watch here, Garth and his wife, Trisha Yearwood, can be seen getting emotional as Kelly sings the lyrics, "Could have missed the pain, but I would've had to miss the dance."

"The Dance" undoubtedly holds a special place in Kelly's heart. The "Breakaway" singer told Garth on her talk show last year that the song helped her process her emotions following her recent divorce from her husband, Brandon Blackstock. It even inspired Kelly to pen her own song about divorce, which will be part of her next album.

"So I'm going through a divorce and there's been a lot of books and people always give you stuff to help, especially when you have kids and stuff," Kelly told Garth. "And there's so much shame and guilt ..."

She continued: "I couldn't quite nail down the feeling. You don't want to crap on it, you don't want to say that [the marriage] doesn't count or matter, but you don't know what to put in it because it didn't work out like you wanted. So, anyway, I kid you not, I was listening to my playlist and 'The Dance' came on. And I was like, 'No, that's the thing. That's it.'"

To watch Kelly's full performance of "The Dance," you'll have to tune into the Kennedy Center Honors ceremony on CBS on Sunday, June 6 at 8 p.m. ET. Those who watch will also catch performances from Derek Hough, Pentatonix, Gladys Knight, Emmylou Harris, Jimmie Allen, Yo-Yo Ma and Vanessa Hudgens.

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