Singer Candice Night, wife of Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, revealed during an interview with Dawn Osborne of TotalRock that her husband of 17 years had recently suffered from a heart attack.
The revelation came when Candice was asked about the possibility of her and Ritchie’s band Blackmore’s Night returning to Europe for a tour in the near future.
“As far as flying anywhere right now, Ritchie has actually been told by his cardiologist not to get in a plane. He had a heart attack about a year and a half ago. He’s got six stents,” she replied.
“And I can’t believe he’s gonna be 80 on April 14th, which is crazy, but he doesn’t look it, still doesn’t act it, but eventually medical things wind up catching up with you. So we’ve gotta make sure we keep him happy and healthy. And he’s dealing with gout and some arthritic things. And, of course, his back has always been an issue for years. So it’s getting harder for him — it’s tricky,” she explained.
“But, hey, I’ve seen people younger than him in wheelchairs on stage doing what they do. So I think he probably doesn’t want people to see him that way. I see the other perspective — from a fan’s perspective, I would think people would just be happy to be under the same roof with him and listen to him play whatever he comes up with. So, we kind of have this discussion, or argument — I’ll say discussion — all the time. [Laughs]”
“But he was just recently at his cardiologist and they said, ‘Let’s put traveling by plane on hold.’ So, hopefully we’ll get that all straightened out and that’ll change. But I’ll let you guys know if it does,” Candice added.
