It’s the hard knock life.
Jay-Z insisted his daughter Blue Ivy doesn’t have “everything … just given to her” while defending the 14-year-old joining mom Beyoncé’s “Renaissance” and “Cowboy Carter” tours.
The teen “fought” to be part of “almost every number,” the rapper, 56, shared with GQ in a rare interview, published Tuesday.
“That was amazing,” the Grammy winner gushed, describing how Blue “fought” to improve her dancing skills after “a lot of conversation around her first performance.”
He recalled, “She still was going through the motions. And then she just started fighting back. I saw her fight maybe for the first time in her life — like, not everything … is easy.”
Jay-Z added that he was especially “proud” she “fought for something that she really wanted to do” because his and Beyoncé’s eldest child effortlessly inherited their music skills.
He revealed that Blue, who he doesn’t think will “get off that stage now,” has “perfect pitch” and “teach[es] herself” songs.
“Blue is a crazy pianist, but she won’t let us get her a teacher,” he noted. “She doesn’t want it to be a job.”
Beyoncé said in her December 2023 concert film that she initially denied her daughter’s request to come on stage.
“Dismayed” Beyoncé was upset over Blue reading harsh online comments about her “lackluster” moves, the New York Times revealed in a review at the time.
The “Love on Top” singer was allegedly “thrilled … that instead of quitting, she decided to put in the work and train even harder for future stops.”
Blue has collaborated with her parents on their projects over the years, even winning a Grammy in 2021 for her work on “Brown Skin Girl.”
Beyoncé and Jay-Z are also the parents of 8-year-old twins Sir and Rumi — and the record executive raved over fatherhood elsewhere in his cover story.
“It gives everything meaning, everything,” he said. “I’ll go cross-country, do what I have to do, and I’m back on the plane that night.
He added, “I love taking them to school. I love picking them up.”
