Tag: Legends

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Luther & Dionne: Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow

Luther Vandross‘s journey into the world of entertainment was sparked by a memorable experience at the Fox Theater in Brooklyn, NY, where he had the chance to watch Dionne Warwick perform.

Luther shared with the New York Times that witnessing her magic on stage inspired him to connect with audiences in a similar way. Luther fondly remarked, “It was women like Dionne Warwick, Aretha Franklin, and The Supremes who drove me to the stereo.” He believed that women, in their performances, were more willing to dive deep emotionally and take creative risks, showcasing their talents with flair.

A beautiful friendship blossomed between Luther and Dionne after Cissy Houston, Luther’s friend, introduced them backstage at Radio City Music Hall. They became so close that when he recorded A House Is Not A Home, Dionne was the first person he wanted to share it with. Dionne praised Luther’s ability to put his unique spin on her songs, saying, “He didn’t do Dionne Warwick. He did Luther Vandross interpreting what Dionne Warwick had done, and he was a genius.”

In 1983, Clive Davis enlisted Luther to produce Dionne’s album, How Many Times Can You Say Goodbye. The final track on the album features Dionne’s interpretation of Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, a classic penned by Carole King and Gerry Grolnick.

Not everyone knows that before she left to get married, Dionne joined the Shirelles, stepping in for Shirley Owens and Doris Coley, and continued with the group starting in 1963.

Luther, a devoted fan of the Shirelles, would later share with the New York Times, “First, I was a down and desperate fan of the Shirelles. Then, when I saw Dionne Warwick at the Brooklyn Fox, my life changed. She showed me there were standards.” To honor her legacy, Luther surprised Dionne by bringing in the original Shirelles members to join her on a track.

Dionne reminisced, “We had a ball recording that song. We laughed a lot, let me tell you!” Luther even playfully told her, “See! You ARE a rock and roll singer!”

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Dionne & Luther


From a fan’s deep admiration to becoming the star’s trusted producer, the friendship between Dionne Warwick and Luther Vandross blossomed beautifully over the years, much like the incredible music they created together. Here’s a delightful timeline of their remarkable musical journey.

As a young boy growing up in the Bronx, Luther Vandross was captivated by the power of music and found a hero in Dionne Warwick. Listening to her soothing voice on the radio sparked his passion. The moment he saw her perform live at the Brooklyn Fox Theater, it was like magic.

“She came on stage and just killed me,” he recalled, reflecting on how the serious nature of her music resonated with him. The song Anyone Who Has a Heart left an everlasting impact, inspiring him to chase his dreams in music.

Years later, Luther reminisced about how pivotal that experience was: “The person single-handedly responsible for me deciding to pursue artistic things was Dionne Warwick. It was at the Brooklyn Fox Theatre.” This early connection fueled his desire to create his musical legacy.

While studying in college in Michigan, Luther cleverly navigated his way backstage to meet his idol. He told the security team he was Dionne’s cousin, and when he finally got to meet her, he introduced himself with a grin. Dionne played along, and just like that, a beautiful friendship began to blossom. Their late-night phone calls often turned into lively discussions about their shared love for wrestling, showcasing the warmth and joy in their bond.

Dionne couldn’t help but praise Luther, calling him a “fantastic musician” and an “absolute joy” to work with. Their chemistry was undeniable, leading to a harmonious partnership.

The world first got to experience Luther’s incredible talent in 1981 with his debut album, Never Too Much. His breathtaking rendition of A House Is Not A Home quickly climbed the charts, becoming a staple on quiet storm radio stations nationwide. Dionne herself lauded his version, stating that Luther recorded the definitive rendition of her iconic song, making it uniquely his own.

In 1983, their collaboration deepened when Luther produced Dionne’s album How Many Times Can We Say Goodbye. He took the helm as the producer and lent his smooth vocals to a duet on the title track and co-wrote several songs for the album, including the enchanting So Amazing.

Just a few years later, Luther honorably covered So Amazing for his album Give Me The Reason in 1986, showcasing the strong influence Dionne continued to have on his career.

Interestingly, Dionne initially wanted Luther to join her on the iconic song That’s What Friends Are For, but due to scheduling conflicts, Elton John stepped in. However, the stars aligned in 1987 when Luther performed the song alongside Dionne, Whitney Houston, and Stevie Wonder at the Soul Train Music Awards, creating a performance that would echo through time.

The heartfelt anthem raised over $3 million for the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR), exemplifying the artists’ commitment to important causes.

On that very night, Luther Vandross shined brightly, winning the Male Album of the Year award for Give Me the Reason, which featured his first top-20 pop hit, Stop to Love.

Throughout his career, Luther continued to honor Dionne’s legacy by reinterpreting her beloved songs from the legendary songwriting duo Burt Bacharach and Hal David, including unforgettable hits like Anyone Who Had a Heart, A House Is Not A Home, and Are You There (With Another Guy).

Their vibrant friendship and musical partnership created a lasting legacy that inspires artists and fans alike.

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Luther Vandross Documentary Opens Coming To Theaters In November 2024

Luther Vandross’s Never Too Much documentary opens in theaters starting November 1st!

I’ve seen it thrice and walked away with a different insight each time. One of the things I enjoy most is seeing Luther’s discipline, drive, and determination to succeed. It’s easy to think Luther had no trouble getting signed to a record deal, but the opposite is true. He spent his own money, earned from singing jiggles, to finance his demo and was rejected by several labels.

I never met anyone with his convictions. He taught me to believe in myself and my ideas and to invest in them.

The documentary relives the many stunning moments of Luther’s musical career while exploring his personal life, health struggles related to mismanaged type 2 diabetes, and a lifelong battle to earn the respect his music deserved.

Using a wealth of rarely seen archives, Luther tells his story with assistance from his closest friends, ME (!), and musical collaborators, including Mariah Carey, Dionne Warwick, Valerie Simpson, and Roberta Flack.

It’s strange to see yourself on screen and share such a traumatic experience. I am grateful to everyone who has supported, participated, and partnered with me with my diabetes nonprofit organization, Divabetic.

After Luther’s stroke, I could have left his side and found work supporting another musical artist. Instead, I chose a different path. I educated myself about diabetes (I have a family history of type 1 and type 2 diabetes) and helped educate and empower others so that we could all keep our house a home.

I still believe that’s the best way to honor Luther’s legacy.

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Divabetic Salutes Teena Marie

Teena Marie was an R&B singer, songwriter, musician, and producer. She was known by her childhood nickname Tina before taking the stage name Teena Marie, and later, Rick James nicknamed her Lady T.

During her lifetime, she made music that shattered narrow-minded marketing categories and gender roles. Teena Marie was the rare woman in charge of her material. She wrote, produced, and performed her records for much of her career, which took off in 1979.

Early in her career, Teena Marie told Dick Clark on American Bandstand that from the time she was eight years old, she dreamed of being on Motown Records. She said, “I used to look at the blue label and say, Oh, God, it (Motown) must be the most fabulous place’.”

After several creative delays at Motown, she caught the attention of Rick James, who was establishing himself in 1970s soul funk music.

In his autobiography Memoirs Of A Super Freak, Rick James describes his first encounter with Teena Marie as, “Never in my life had I heard such a range with so much passion in a white voice.”

With Rick’s help, Teena’s first single, ‘I’m A Sucker For Your Love,’ conceived initially as a potential duet for Rick James and Diana Ross, exploded into the Top Ten of Billboard’s R&B charts. “We deliberately didn’t put her picture on the album cover,” said Rick James, “because we wanted to confuse people and make them wonder whether Teena was black or white.” The song spent six months on the charts.

Looking back at that time, Teena Marie said, “Black people would always say, “I didn’t know you were White.” But people like good music,” She added, “At the end of the day, you have to sing what’s in your own soul.”

After Rick James passed, Teena Marie became addicted to Vicodin, initially diagnosed for her physical pain from a series of accidents. “Once I realized that those pills not only took away my physical agony by masking my emotional pain, I really became addicted,” she told Essense Magazine.

For Teena, Losing Rick James meant losing her musical soulmate, and her grief was unbearable. “We were like an extension of each other. I miss all our talks. We were like family; only family can talk about family, not anyone else.”


I am grateful to Teena Marie for paving the way for people like me. I was one of a handful of white men working for R&B performers in the 1990s. I traveled my path by following Teena Marie’s footprints.

 On this Divabetic podcast, we’re talking about BLUES, Addiction, and Diabetes with musical inspiration from Etta James. Etta James is a Grammy Award-winning singer best known for her iconic hits “At Last.” Guests include Poet Lorraine Brooks, the Charlie’s Angels of Outreach, Dr. Monique Renee Rolle DPM, Catherine Schuller, Susan Greenberg Weiner MS, RDN, CDE, CDN, and Mama Rose Marie. Prize giveaways courtesy of Earth Brand Shoes, Dr. Greenfield’s Diabetic Foot Creams, Cabot Cheese, and Nu Naturals.
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A Little Respect by Lorraine Brooks

Enjoy this poem, A Little Respect, by Lorraine Brooks. Lorraine shared this poem on Divabetic’s podcast inspired by Aretha Franklin. 

Over the years, Lorraine has shared poems shedding light on society’s shame and blame directed at people with diabetes’s size and shape. Aretha Franklin struggled with several undisclosed issues (pancreatic cancer, type diabetes, tobacco use) and fluctuating weight issues throughout her career. It’s been reported that at age 34,  Aretha started yoyo dieting with alternating weight loss and gain.

A LITTLE RESPECT by Lorraine Brooks

Look at me.
Look at the pain
In my eyes.
All that you see
Is my
Overweight size.
Inside is a person
Who needs to
Be heard.
Needs to let go of
The hurt
I’ve incurred.
I’m not uninformed
And I’m not unaware.
I am not lazy
And yes, I DO care.
I haven’t abandoned
My health or my needs.
I’ve just redefined
What it means
To Succeed.
I am not here
To live up to your charts
Or conform to your standards
For my body parts.
It’s not called depression
It doesn’t need meds
I won’t go to blazes and
I won’t drop dead.
I don’t have the answer
To all of life’s queries,
I don’t want to hear about
All of your theories.
Just treat me with value
As part of the clan
And do not compare me to those
Smaller than.
Look at me
Look at the smile
I reflect
And treat me with love
And a little
Respect.

Enjoy this episode of Divabetic’s podcast with music from Aretha Franklin.

Aretha Franklin was considered the legend of legends, a groundbreaking singer with the fortitude to transcend race and genre, using voice as the bulldozer to break down every barrier set up in her way.

Aretha’s health journey sparks a discussion about the uncertain connection between pancreatic cancer and diabetes. Long-standing diabetes can be considered a risk factor for pancreatic cancer. It causes a modest increase in the risk of 1.5- to two-fold. Other risk factors for pancreatic cancer include smoking, chronic pancreatitis (inflammation of the pancreas), family history of pancreatic cancer, obesity, and specific genetic syndromes.

Guests include Poet Lorraine Brooks, Dr. Wendy Satin Rapaport, Diabetes Strong’s owner Christel Oerum, Beautyphonics CEO and “Beneath The Makeup” Author Suzanne Perez, Jessica Clark, and Trisha Artman.

This podcast features music from Aretha Franklin’s ‘Aretha Franklin Sings the Great Diva Classics’ courtesy of SONY Music.

Diabetes Late Nite is a fast-paced, full-filled hour of diabetes education and wellness advice that encourages listeners to “laugh a little, learn a  lot.”

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Serve, Taste or Trash! At the Apollo Theater

The happy healthcare host, Mr. Divabetic plays the food game, Serve, Taste or Trash!, outside the Apollo Theater in Harlem, New York. The game spotlights the harmful added sugar in some of our favorite drinks.

Most of us drink more calories and added sugar than we think.

Added sugars include sucrose, dextrose, table sugar, syrups, honey, and sugars from concentrated fruit or vegetable juices.

Added sugars contribute calories to your diet but no essential nutrients.

Popular sugar-sweetened beverages that contain added sugar are iced teas, sports drinks, soda, fruit juice, and flavored iced coffees.

Drinking too much added sugar makes achieving a healthy eating pattern difficult without taking in too many calories.

The American Heart Association suggests limiting the amount of added sugar to no more than 100 calories per day (about 6 teaspoons or 24 grams) for most adult women and no more than 150 calories per day (about 9 teaspoons or 36 grams of sugar) for most men.

The Apollo Theater is a national icon with a legacy that resonates across generations, ethnic groups, and continents. Since opening its doors in 1914 and introducing the first Amateur Night contests in 1934, the Apollo Theater has played a major role in the emergence of innovative musical genres, including jazz, swing, bebop, R&B, gospel blues, and soul. Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughn, Billie Holiday, Sammy Davis Jr., James Brown, Bill Cosby, Gladys Knight, Luther Vandross, D’Angelo, Lauryn Hill, and countless others began their road to stardom on the Apollo stage.

Mr. Divabetic talks to Billy Mitchell, the resident historian and official tour guide for the Apollo Theater, about some little-known facts about the theater and the legendary people who performed there.

Tune in to Divabetic’s free monthly podcasts hosted by Mr. Divabetic on blog Talk-Radio, iTunes, and Spotify.  Guests include healthcare collaborators, beauty, image/style, fitness experts, entertainment industry leaders, and VIPs: women and men living with, at risk of, and affected by diabetes.

We’re honored to celebrate Luther Vandross and his musical legacy and raise awareness for diabetes health-related complications (such as stroke) on our annual Luther Vandross Tribute podcast.

In the years since Luther’s passing, one constant has remained to define his life and musical success: the voice. Like any great singer of the past 100 years, Luther Vandross’ voice and distinct singing style led to monumental success and instant recognition when you hear him singing–through your stereo, on the car radio, on TV, or in a movie. With that voice was Luther’s unique ability to write and sing about love and the shared emotions we all feel in searching for and enjoying love. Through his songs, for the last two generations, Luther Vandross became a staple in the most joyous moments of people’s lives.

Featured guests include Patricia Addie-Gentle RN, CDE, Luther percussionist Steve Kroon, Luther vocalists Tawatha Agee and Pat Lacy, Luther historian Leon Petrossian, members of ‘The Luther Re-Lives Experience’, family members, friends, and superfans.

Throughout the podcast, we feature songs from the album entitled Luther Vandross courtesy of SONY Music.

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What’s Trending This Week At Divabetic

Check out the latest headlines in diabetes, diabetes self-management, healthy lifestyles and diva entertainment that we think you should know about this weekend.

FDA Approves First Blood Sugar Monitor without Finger Prick

Abbott’s new FreeStyle Libre Flash Glucose Monitoring System, approved Wednesday by the Food and Drug Administration, uses a small sensor attached to the upper arm. Patients wave a reader device over it to see the current blood sugar level and changes over the past eight hours. READ MORE

Seattle-Caught Salmon Contains Cocaine, Antidepressants & Pain Relievers

Salmon is purported to be one of the healthiest foods due to its high omega-3 content, protein, and essential fatty acids, but if the fish is obtained from the Puget Sound, it is anything but healthy.

According to a recent study, up to 81 drugs and personal-care products were detected in the flesh of salmon caught in the Puget Sound. Some of the drugs include Prozac, Advil, Benadryl, Lipitor, and even cocaine. READ MORE

Non-nutritive Sweeteners Can Aid Weight Management in Diabetes

A scientific statement from the American Heart Association and American Diabetes Association concluded that non-nutritive sweeteners, when used carefully, may aid in reducing total energy intake and assist with weight loss or weight control while providing beneficial effects on related metabolic parameters. READ MORE

FDA Approves New Fast-Acting Mealtime Insulin

Officials with the FDA have approved fast-acting insulin aspart (Fiasp, Novo Nordisk) for the treatment of adults with diabetes. Fiasp is a fast-acting mealtime insulin designed for individuals in need of improved overall glucose control. READ MORE

8 Powerful Women (including Jillian Michaels and Victoria Beckham) Who Have Opened Up About Their Struggles With PCOS

Polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) affects about 10 million women in the world. If you’re personally coping with PCOS, always remember that you are not alone. In fact, even some major celebrities with PCOS have used their platform to speak out about their struggles (and triumphs!) with the disorder, and cultivate awareness in our society. READ MORE

Music Spotlight: Kelsea Ballerini’s song, “Legends”  is a mid-tempo ballad reflecting on a past love, though Ballerini also views the song as a message to her fans.

“I wrote it from the perspective of a breakup,” Ballerini told RSC. “Now I’m in such a different place in my life that, to me at least, it’s a love song about a love that you look back on that doesn’t even necessarily have to end. I hope my fans hear it as a letter to them but also they hear their own love story in it too.” READ MORE

Movie Spotlight: “Our Souls At Night” starring Robert Redford and Jane Fonda As Neighbors With Benefits

“Our Souls at Night” chronicles the blossoming of a December-December romance between two neighbors in the fictional prairie town of Holt, Colo. It begins not with a spark of passion but with a sensible, if unusual, proposal. Addie Moore shows up at Louis Waters’s house and asks if he will sleep with her. Addie doesn’t mean she wants to have sex with Louis. She wants to slide under the covers next to him, turn off the bedside lamp and chat quietly until slumber arrives, simulating the easy marital intimacy that the two of them, both long widowed, have learned to live without. Louis, startled by the idea, agrees to think about it. READ MORE

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