Lady Gaga Uses Chess To Steal Show At Coachella

Lady Gaga set the music world and chess community on fire with how she used a chessboard and its pieces to bring a dramatic musical performance to life at the 2025 Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival.

Chess Dance Battle At Coachella

On the Coachella stage on Friday (April 18) as part of the second weekend of events, Lady Gaga performed her 2008 hit “Poker Face” on a giant chessboard. She was dressed in black and faced off against a mysterious white queen. Her dancers represented chess pieces (except neither side had a king) as the match unfolded and Gaga battled her old era in the chess game.

Mother Monster lit up the stage with larger-than-life energy and a breathtaking performance. Because she is about to embark on her Mayhem Ball tour, her performance was one of the most anticipated of the year. The chess game served as a visual metaphor for her artistic persona and the battle she was portraying on stage.

Unusual Chessboard For Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga’s chessboard has an unusual design, perhaps befitting a battle between two queen figures with no kings on the board. Although a chessboard has 64 squares (eight rows by eight files), Gaga’s board is a seven-by-seven grid, or just 49 squares. With no square needed for a king in the starting position, an irregular board fits the performance.

With 49 squares, every corner square is white. Don’t ask if the queen starts on her color because the center queen square on both sides of the board is black.

“Poker Face”

The audience was mesmerized as Lady Gaga sang “Poker Face,” which has a dark musical tone, and her accompanying chess pieces danced. When the song was released in 2008 as the second single from her album The Fame, it sold over 14 million copies and is one of the world’s best-selling singles ever. Watch the official music video of “Poker Face” below.

Coachella 2025

The music festival is known for its influencer and celebrity attendees as well as its California desert backdrop. Coachella 2025 took take place April 11-13 and April 18-20 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California.

Before performing at Coachella 2025, Lady Gaga promised high artistry. She said, “I think Coachella is an opportunity to do something unique and special. So yes to the hits, but also yes to high artistry.”

I think Coachella is an opportunity to do something unique and special.
—Lady Gaga

This performance by Lady Gaga was the 39-year-old’s second time headlining the festival. It followed her show in 2017 when she performed a mix of her chart-topping hits, including “Born This Way,” “Just Dance,” “You and I,” and “Bad Romance.”

Powerful Celebrity

Known for her image reinventions and versatility, Lady Gaga has long been a major influence in the music industry. She has sold an estimated 170 million records. Time magazine has twice (2010 and 2019) named her as one of the 100 most influential people in the world.

But Does Lady Gaga Play Chess?

Little is known if Lady Gaga plays chess. If she does as she illustrated at Coachella 2025, she might prefer playing without kings and having all the attention focused on the queens.

Lady Gaga’s production at Coachella 2025 was showstopping. It is even more intriguing because she used chess as the platform to help the audience interpret her performance.