Diddy's twin daughters, son King join him on stage at VMAs as he accepts Global Icon Award

Sean "Diddy" Combs has been a global icon but Tuesday night, he was awarded with the official honor at the MTV VMAs.

Before accepting the Global Icon Award from Mary J. Blige and his daughter Chance Combs, the Grammy-winning hip hop mogul, 53, took to the MTV Video Music Awards stage to perform an iconic collection of his biggest hits including "Mo Money Mo Problems," "I'll Be Missing You" and "It's All About the Benjamins."

Diddy was joined onstage by some of his greatest collaborators including Yung Miami for "Gotta Move On (Queens Remix" and Keyshia Cole for "Last Night." His performance Tuesday was also a family affair as his twins Jessie and D'Lila Combs joined their father onstage as backup dancers and son Christian "King" Combs performed alongside him.

Diddy says receiving Global Icon Award was 'dream come true'

Following his performance, the rapper rocked up to the stage in a shiny red outfit to officially accept his award.

"This is a dream come true for me. I grew up watching MTV like, 'Man, I wish one day I could be up there,' " Diddy said. "And, you know, I started out as a paper boy, y'all. I didn't know I was going to be here. Started out as a paper boy at 12. And then I was going to be an NFL football player for the Pittsburgh Steelers."

He went on, "The Pittsburgh Steelers didn't notice, but I planned on being a football player, and my leg got broke the last year. Then I got depressed and I would be in the clubs dancing in New York doing my Diddy bop, and then people would see me and they would cast me for videos. And that's how I fell in love with the music industry."

Diddy finished his speech with gratitude for how his life and career have panned out.

"Sometimes we get hit with those hard things; as I said, I thought I was going to be playing for the Pittsburgh Steelers," he said. "But God made another choice. And I thank God for this choice that he made for me to be able to touch you with my music, give you a good time, make you dance, make you feel good. That's the only intention."

"30 years consistently is truly a gift from God," he said.

Diddy is the third recipient of the award, following the Red Hot Chili Peppers in 2022 and the Foo Fighters in 2021. The Global Icon Award "celebrates an artist or band whose unparalleled career and continued influence have achieved a unique level of global success in music and beyond," according to a Tuesday press release.

This marked Diddy's first performance at the VMAs since 2005. At the end of his speech, Diddy announced his new album, "The Love Album: Off the Grid," will drop Friday.

Diddy was nominated this year for four awards, including best collaboration for two songs: "Gotta Move On" and "Creepin' (Remix)."

Diddy's daughters had some input for his MTV VMAs set list

Ahead of their father accepting the award, USA TODAY caught up with D'Lila, Jessie and Chance Combs, who shared how proud they are of their dad.

"He deserves the world. He deserves this. He deserves everything," D’Lila said.

Chance and Jessie shared that they had some input for which hits made it on Diddy’s playlist, too.

"We had a little bit of a say," Jessie said.

Earlier this month, the rapper and music mogul, who founded Bad Boy Records in the ‘90s, agreed to give the label’s publishing rights back to all artists and writers who worked with the company, a source close to the situation but not authorized to speak publicly told USA TODAY Monday.

Bad Boy artists such as Faith Evans, Mase, The Lox, 112 and the estate of The Notorious B.I.G. have signed agreements to receive their publishing rights.

Despite receiving multimillion-dollar offers to purchase Bad Boy’s publishing, Combs chose to reallocate publishing rights to the label’s artists and songwriters in an effort to promote the financial mobility of artists, especially within the Black community.

Since its founding by Combs in 1992, Bad Boy Records has sold over 500 million records, produced 38 platinum singles and earned multiple Grammy Awards, according to the official website for Combs Global.

Contributing: Edward Segarra and Ralphie Aversa, USA TODAY; The Associated Press

Diddy to give publishing rights to Bad Boy Records artists Notorious B.I.G., Mase, Faith Evans

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Diddy receives Global Icon Award at MTV VMAs: Read his full speech