Darlene Love bringing her passion to New Bedford’s Zeiterion Theatre

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Darlene Love will perform at the Zeiterion Theatre on Saturday, November 29th, 2014.

New Bedford is in for a treat next week. The amazing Rock n’ Roll Hall-of-Famer Darlene Love will perform at the Zeiterion Theatre on Saturday, November 29th, 2014.

Darlene is a multi-talented star whose group sang a #1 hit song in 1962 (The Blossoms: He’s a Rebel), played Danny Glover’s wife in Lethal Weapon 1-4 and appeared as a regular on the David Letterman Show. Most recently, Darlene starred in the 2013 documentary “20 Feet from Stardom”. The film appeared at the Sundance Film Festival, won the Academy Award in 2014 for Best Documentary, and was nominated by 16 other prestigious film awards. It took decades, but finally Darlene Love and other background singers were the featured act.

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Remember Danny Glover’s wife on Lethal Weapon? Darlene played Trish Murtaugh, Detective Murtaugh’s wife.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Darlene on the phone a few weeks ago. I had heard of Darlene Love, but didn’t know much about the woman. Like most hardworking background singers, she was always there in my life, but out of the spotlight. Remember Cheech and Chong’s “Basketball Jones” song? Darlene was a background singer on that track. Remember Danny Glover’s wife on Lethal Weapon? Darlene played Trish Murtaugh, Detective Murtaugh’s wife. Did you watch the Academy Awards and notice

I asked her what it was like being featured on 20 Feet from Stardom.

“When I got the call from the producers, I let them know about several other background singers. The Blossoms (Darlene Love, Fanita James, and Jean King) were first black background group. The producer Gil Friesen called me and I gave him a rundown. It is hard to find material on background singers because we were always 20 feet behind the main act. I was featured because they had so much film on me. I was excited to be part of it and didn’t realize how big it was going to be.”

Darlene accepting the Oscar and taking the opportunity to show off her voice:

Throughout her career, Darlene has worked with a long list of stars like Aretha Franklin, David Letterman, Mel Gibson and Danny Glover, but her favorite performer to work with was Elvis.

“The most interesting person I ever worked with was Elvis. He was such an amazing person and being around him was wonderful. I did a movie and performed with him. We’d break for lunch and we would sing gospel together. Sometimes it could take hours to come down from the high of a show and Gospel was how Elvis relaxed after a show.”

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Once you talk to Darlene and learn about her life story you’ll quickly realize that she is a strong, remarkable woman that is finally getting her due. In 1995 Love won the Rhythm and Blues Foundation’s Pioneer Award and on March 14, 2011, she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with a speech by Bette Midler.

It’s rare that such an amazing, accomplished musician comes to New Bedford and fans of music should spend an evening with Darlene next Saturday. My suggestion is to watch 20 Feet From Stardom this weekend or next week, and grab your Darlene Love tickets now: https://ticketing.zeiterion.org/public/Default.asp. You can thank me later.

For more details check out Darlene Love’s website: http://darleneloveworld.com/ or follow her on Facebook or Twitter.

About Michael Silvia

Served 20 years in the United States Air Force. Owner of New Bedford Guide.

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