Search for
Search for
Search forLegendary diva is still walking on by
Friday, November 21, 2008, 11:00
Her spectacular career has spanned more than four decades from her first live appearance in Paris with Marlene Dietrich to her Grammy-winning That's What Friends Are For which has raised millions for Aids research and gave her more than 60 chart hits.
The partnership with songwriting team Burt Bacharach and Hal David has provided a soundtrack for generations – Walk On By, Anyone Who Had A Heart, Do You Know the Way To San Jose, Don't Make Me Over, This Girl's In Love With You, I'll Never Fall In Love Again... the list goes on and on.
But modestly, Dionne tells me that the huge success wasn't something she planned to do. "It just kind of happened."
Dionne, now 67, was born into a musical family in New Jersey. Her aunt, Cissy, is the mother of Whitney Houston.
Dionne sang in a gospel choir as a child and was exposed to all sorts of different music – "jazz, pop, rock, church" – before joining the family group, The Drinkard Singers, which included Cissy and Dionne's sister Dee Dee.
Working with Bacharach and David gave her the break she needed to forge a solo career.
"Meeting Burt Bacharach and Hal David was the beginning of all our glory years," she says. "I met Burt at a recording session. I was making demo records for him but it became apparent that I could really sing.
"And now I've been in the business 48 years. It's been full of adventure – going places and seeing things I had only dreamed about.
"There was never even a thought that it could happen to me. No way in the world! I think we were all surprised. But it was a wonderful, pleasant surprise.
Dionne tells the story of her success in a one-woman show, My Music and Me, which is playing two dates in the Westcountry – Torquay and Truro – next week. With so many hits, how does she decide which ones to perform?
"I do love them all, every single one," she says. "They're like my children. I really could do a show that was five or six hours long!
"It's really a question of what do you not sing? So I sing the ones people know and they've grown to love.
"I'm totally blessed by having hit records that are songs that have become part of everybody else's life. It's incredible. I have a lot of fun with the audience. I talk to them and they respond to me. The show is called My Music and Me and it's basically giving them a glimpse of my life and a biography of my music. It's a wonderful show."
Dionne – whose son David plays drums on the show, says that travelling when you're older is not as much fun as it used to be.
"Getting up at dawn, travelling to the show and then getting up early again the next day. But as soon as you get on stage, it's all forgotten."
Dionne Warwick is at the Princess Theatre, Torquay (0844 847 2315) on Thursday, November 27 and The Hall for Cornwall, Truro (01872 262 466) on Friday, November 28
Personal Injury Specialists. No Win No Fee, As Seen On TV.
Pet Insurance- 5% Online Discount
UK Pet Insurance. Buy instantly online. From just £4.85 per month.
Lose Weight Fast with Weight Loss Pills
Easy way to lose weight with weight loss pills. Lose weight fast.
Comment on this story