(CNN) Carrie Underwood gave her first public performance since an accident in November left her with a broken wrist and a facial injury.
The singer, who appeared fully recovered, gave a powerful delivery of her new single "Cry Pretty" at the Academy of Country Music Awards on Sunday. The crowd responded with a standing ovation that lasted nearly a minute.
Underwood shared on her website in January that she had fallen on the porch of her Nashville home, resulting in a broken wrist and a facial injury that required "40-50 stitches."
Carrie Underwood receives standing ovation after performing 'Cry Pretty'
"When I am ready to get in front of a camera, I want you all to understand why I might look a bit different," Underwood wrote at the time.
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Carrie Underwood made her first public appearance since suffering an accident at home in November that left her with a broken wrist and 40 to 50 stitches in her face — and on the basis of the performance as well as the photo she posted on Instagram yesterday, we’d never have known she’d been injured. She delivered a powerful performance of “Cry Pretty,” the first single from her forthcoming album, her first for Universal Nashville, which does not yet have a title or a release date.
Wearing sparkles around her eyes in the shape of tears, as she does in the visuals for the single, traces of any injury were not detectable on television. Reactions on social media after her performance ranged from enthusiasm to relief to confusion to cynicism.
The song is a sweeping power ballad that at times is more reminiscent of Guns N’ Roses’s “November Rain” than much of her previous work. In the post, she writes of working with writer/producer David Garcia — who’s worked both with Christian country artists as well as Florida Georgia Line — and said he’s co-producing her forthcoming album with her.
As “Cry Pretty,” “I wrote it with three incredible women: Hillary Lindsey, Liz Rose, and Lori McKenna, who also write under the name Love Junkies,” she wrote. “I joined one of their writing sessions last year to see if we could come up with some magic…and we did! The title refers to when emotions take over and you just can’t hold them back. It really speaks to a lot of things that have happened in the past year and I hope when you hear it, you can relate those feelings to those times in your life. It’s emotional. It’s real. And it ROCKS!”
Related Carrie Underwood Posts First Close-Up Facial Photo Since ‘Gruesome' Accident Carrie Underwood Drops New Song 'Cry Pretty,' Says Her Face Is 'Healing Nicely' (Listen)
In a post on her website last week, the singer said her face is “healing pretty nicely” since the accident. “First off, physically, I’m doing pretty darn good these days!,” she wrote. “My wrist is almost back to normal, about 90% there…and the docs say that last 10% will come in time. And my face has been healing pretty nicely as well. I definitely feel more like myself than I have in a while.”
Five months after the fall that left her with “between 40-50 stitches” in her face, and “not quite looking the same,” Carrie Underwood posted a close-up selfie to Instagram on Saturday night, in advance of her Sunday performance at the Academy of Country Music Awards. “Had a great rehearsal for the @acmawards! Can’t wait until tomorrow night!“ she wrote in the caption, teasing her performance of her new song “Cry Pretty.”
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The caption for her Instagram photo was short, but she shared a longer life update on her Web site last week. “First off, physically, I’m doing pretty darn good these days!” she wrote. “My wrist is almost back to normal, about 90% there . . . and the docs say that last 10% will come in time. And my face has been healing pretty nicely as well. I definitely feel more like myself than I have in a while.”
She also said that all this time healing allowed her to spend more time with her husband Mike Fisher and their son Isaiah: “I’ve been calling it ‘forced relaxation.’ Sometimes I think things happen in order to make us slow down.“
In the same post, she announced her upcoming album and new single, “Cry Pretty,” which she co-wrote with songwriters, Hillary Lindsey, Liz Rose, and Lori McKenna. The three collectively call themselves the Love Junkies. “The title refers to when emotions take over and you just can’t hold them back,” Underwood wrote. “It really speaks to a lot of things that have happened in the past year and I hope when you hear it, you can relate those feelings to those times in your life.”
