SOUTH LOS ANGELES — Hundreds of community residents recently gathered at the South Park Recreational Center to celebrate the renaming and dedication ceremony for the Barry White Recreational Center in honor of the late singer who grew up in the neighborhood.
The ribbon-cutting ceremony included the unveiling of a bronze plaque that will permanently commemorate White’s link to the South Park neighborhood.
White, who became a worldwide star universally known for his distinctive bass voice, was a singer, songwriter, producer and two-time Grammy award winner known for such hits as “Can’t Get Enough of Your Love, Babe” and “You’re the First, the Last, My Everything.”
During his life, White was instrumental in saving South Park after city officials announced plans to build a high school on the property.
“One thing is for certain,” City Councilman Curren Price said during the park ceremony. “Barry White never forgot his roots and he was proud of his neighborhood. Tonight, we gather not only to celebrate his incredible legacy but to reaffirm his enduring commitment to this neighborhood through the rededication of this community space.”
Colleagues in attendance spoke fondly of White, including songwriter Rory Darvel, who co-wrote White’s two-time Grammy winning song, “Staying Power.”
“We had a great time working with Barry and the family was fabulous to us,” Darvel said. “I’m forever grateful and I thank him.”
“The thing with us is that it was more than music,” said longtime friend and collaborator Joey Paschal. “It was the stories. (White) gave me the one (piece of) advice that I still use to this day. I had a situation where I was having what you would call one of those walls (blocking) creativity. And he just came up to me and said, ‘Just try everything, Doc,’”
The unveiling was followed by a savory soul food dinner and an old-fashioned sock hop as White impersonator Theo Luv serenaded the crowd with White classics.
In his autobiography, White recalled that he was greatly influenced by his mother, who was fond of playing classical music at home.
The music lover often tried to emulate the piano playing he heard on his mother’s records.
A humorous incident occurred in his youth when White’s voice suddenly changed from a child’s high squeaky voice to the deep bass that became his vocal signature.
“I was 13 or 14,” wrote. “I woke up one morning and I spoke to my mother. I scared both of us.”
White admitted his adolescent years were tumultuous.
“My childhood was very naughty,” White said in his autobiography, adding that he dropped out of high school at the age of 16.
“I was an ex-gang banger from L.A.,” he wrote. “I burglarized, I stole cars. I was fighting, partying, and low riding, but you learn as you get older. You must become a man one day and put away childish things.”
White was eventually jailed for four months for stealing $30,000 worth of Cadillac tires, but his brief incarceration proved to be a turning point.
“Yeah, you’re in jail, but how did you get here?” White said he asked himself in his autobiography. “It was nothing but Barry that put you in. And the only way to get you out of here was that Barry was going to get you out of here.
“I could stay here and go to the penitentiary and get myself killed or get up off my tail and try to do something in life. I had no education — I was a 12th grade dropout. Music was the only thing I had.”
After being released from jail, White skipped class on his 18th birthday to walk to Capitol Records headquarters in Hollywood where he stood across the street and stared at the building for hours. The trip turned out to be an epiphany that bolstered his inspiration to eventually work in the entertainment industry, despite not knowing how to read or write music.
White was eventually hired by Bob Keane of Del-Fi Records where he wrote songs for Viola Willis, Felice Taylor and the Bobby Fuller Four.
His greatest success came in the 1970s as a singer with the Love Unlimited Orchestra and as a solo artist.
The Love Unlimited Orchestra, a 40-piece orchestra group also played behind Love Unlimited, a trio of R&B singers that included lead singer Glodean Beverly James. Love soon blossomed for James and White who married in 1974 and had four children.
White recorded 20 studio albums during his career. Twenty of his singles were certified gold, and another 10 were certified platinum with worldwide record sales in excess of 100 million records.
He also established his own record label, Unlimited Gold, but folded the label in 1983.
Nicknamed “The Walrus of Love,” White, who died in 2003 at the age of 58, posthumously received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 2013. The star is located at 6914 Hollywood Blvd.
Shirley Hawkins is a freelance reporter for Wave Newspapers. She can be reached at shirleyhawkins700@gmail.com.
