Ed Sheeran breaches royal protocol by touching Prince Charles as he receives MBE

The Shape of You singer seemed unfazed by his obvious gaffe 
Awkward: Ed Sheeran breaches royal protocol by touching Prince Charles' arm
Yui Mok/PA
Jennifer Ruby8 December 2017
The Weekender

Sign up to our free weekly newsletter for exclusive competitions, offers and theatre ticket deals

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Ed Sheeran managed to breach royal protocol while picking up his MBE at Buckingham Palace.

The pop star made an embarrassing gaffe by touching Prince Charles on the arm instead of simply shaking his hand, breaking royal rules.

Despite being on his best behaviour, the Shape of You singer reached out and grabbed the future King’s arm during the Investiture ceremony on Thursday.

But the 26-year-old seemed unfazed by his error, insisting that he had had a good conversation with the Prince of Wales.

“He was asking me if I was still selling lots of records and I told him I've got a concert in New York tomorrow, and he was quite surprised I was flying after this,” he said.

“My grandfather was a massive royalist. He had all the commemorative plates and stiff, and he died on this day four years ago, so it's actually quite a nice full circle thing. I guess he'd be pretty proud.”

Ed Sheeran Investiture - In pictures

1/4

Sheeran also claimed that his global success was all due to “persistence” rather than talent.

“I think it's persistence. I don't have a vast amount of talent compared to other people,” he said.

“I think talent is like 30% of it and persistence, drive and self-belief are the other ones, which I guess are all the same thing.”

The singer-songwriter also revealed that he would be keen to sing at Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s forthcoming wedding.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in