His Eye Is on the Sparrow (Lauryn Hill & Tanya Blount)
A pre-fame Lauryn Hill and Tanya Blount turned a Sunday-school hymn into the emotional peak of a mainstream comedy, and the duet still holds up as the definitive modern version.
By Song Reviews · September 13, 2026
A pre-fame Lauryn Hill and Tanya Blount turned a Sunday-school hymn into the emotional peak of a mainstream comedy, and the duet still holds up as the definitive modern version.
By 1993, “His Eye Is on the Sparrow” had been a crusade and church staple for decades, which made it an odd choice to hand to two teenagers for the climax of a studio comedy sequel. “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit” did it anyway, casting Lauryn Hill – two years before the Fugees’ debut album, five before The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill – alongside Tanya Blount for a full-voice duet that plays as the film’s actual emotional argument rather than a comic beat.
What makes the recording hold up outside the movie is how little it leans on the film’s context to work. Hill and Blount trade the lead the way a genuine duet should – neither one simply backing the other – building from restraint into the kind of key-change climax that’s easy to overdo and hard to earn. This one earns it, largely because both singers commit to the song as a piece of actual belief rather than a vehicle for vocal runs, which is the harder and rarer choice for two young singers handed a showcase moment.
8.6/10 – a Hollywood comedy produced, almost by accident, one of the hymn’s most enduring modern recordings.
Hero image: “Sister Act 2: Back in the Habit” (1993) theatrical poster, courtesy of Buena Vista Pictures Distribution/Walt Disney Studios. Used under fair use for editorial commentary.