Natasha Bedingfield at Calgary Stampede 2025: A charming, cinematic performance
By Ansharah Shakil, July 11 2025—
In 2010, Easy A catapulted English singer-songwriter Natasha Bedingfield’s “Pocketful of Sunshine” to enduring fame. Similarly, Anyone But You did the same for “Unwritten” in 2023. It went so far as to have an end credits montage of the cast singing along to it. Bedingfield’s songs might be destined for the screen. Her performance at this year’s Calgary Stampede, where she donned a black dress and black cowboy hat on the Big Four Roadhouse stage, certainly lived up to that movie magic.
Bedingfield started her set off with “Love Like This”, her collaboration with Sean Kingston, before telling the crowd the next song, the R&B-influenced and refreshing “Single”, was for all the single people in the crowd. Bedingfield switched from “Single” to a cover of Eminem’s “Lose Yourself” without missing a beat. Unexpected as the cover was, the transition makes sense, and Bedingfield’s effortless performance made the song her own.
It’s serendipitous that this year’s Calgary Stampede lineup includes Bedingfield alongside Canadian rock band Simple Plan, set to perform on the final day of Calgary Stampede. Bedingfield is featured on the English version of Simple Plan’s “Jet Lag”, where the back-and-forth between both artists is completely captivating and immediately wins you over as much as the pop-punk refrains.
Bedingfield asked the crowd who was excited for Simple Plan and received loud cheers. She admitted she loved playing “Jet Lag,” and that she was hoping the band would have been able to join her on stage to perform it. That might be in store for Simple Plan’s performance, but the rest of Bedingfield’s set as it was more than delivered, whether it was her four-song medley or her crowd-pleasing cover of Prince’s “Purple Rain.”
Gloriously bright summertime song “Pocketful of Sunshine” is one of Bedingfield’s favourite songs, and for good reason. Emma Stone’s Olive Penderghast might have initially deemed the song the worst song ever, but eventually she was screaming the lyrics. Its determined optimism and catchy lyrics means “Pocketful of Sunshine” eventually grows on you, if you didn’t already love singing it in the first place. Live, Bedingfield put more emotion into each word of the song.
Bedingfield naturally saved the best for last, performing “Unwritten” as her second-to-last song. It was the moment audiences had all been waiting for, and it was well worth the wait. “Unwritten” had been used in multiple films prior to Anyone But You — Ice Princess, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants and Bratz: Forever Diamondz, for example. But Its resurgence is easy to explain by the inclusion of the end-credits montage in Anyone But You.
The usage of the song in the film was already entertaining, but the montage elevated it to become characteristic of happy endings, which is exactly what “Unwritten” is about, with its shimmering vocals and uplifting, feel-good lyrics about dancing in the rain and finding happiness on your own. The gospel choir addition in “Unwritten” makes it the perfect song to sing along to, to release your inhibitions, in Bedingfield’s words. The crowd singing along to every word was “Unwritten” in its natural state.
But “Unwritten” wasn’t the last of the set. Bedingfield had performed “These Words”, an addicting track borne out of her frustration in trying to find inspiration, previously, but brought the remix version of the song back for her finale. Even though the lyrics came about from frustration over not being able to write the perfect love song, “These Words” ended up being a simple, elegant love song, ending off Bedingfield’s set with a triumph.