Buffy Sainte-Marie, Oscar Winner For ‘Up Where We Belong,’ Retires From Live Performances
by Best Classic Bands Staff
Buffy Sainte-Marie (Photo: D. Brian Campbell; used with permission)
Buffy Sainte-Marie has announced her retirement from live performances. The Canadian singer-songwriter made the announcement on August 3, 2023, citing travel-induced health concerns and physical challenges. Sainte-Marie, who turned 82 on Feb. 20, became the first indigenous North American to win an Academy Award when “Up Where We Belong,” which she co-wrote with Jack Nitzsche (her husband at the time) and Will Jennings for the 1982 film An Officer and A Gentleman, won the Oscar for Best Original Song. The duet recording by Jennifer Warnes and Joe Cocker was a #1 single on the Hot 100 and many other countries, and won a second Oscar for the pair as Best Pop Performance By a Duo or Group with Vocals.
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Buffy Sainte-Marie Jack Nitzsche during their acceptance speech at the Academy Awards in 1983
Sainte-Marie was born in the Piapot 75 Reserve in Saskatchewan, Canada, to Cree parents. As a toddler, she was taken from her birth parents in what was known as the “Sixties Scoop,” and adopted by an American couple, Albert and Winifred Sainte-Marie, in a suburb of Boston, Mass. In her early twenties, she toured alone, playing coffeehouses in Toronto and in New York’s Greenwich Village. She was signed to Vanguard Records and released her first album in 1964, continuing to release one annually into the ’70s, five of which charted on the U.S. albums chart. Beginning in 1976, she made regular appearances on Sesame Street. Sainte-Marie’s compositions have been recorded by Janis Joplin (“Cod’ine”) and Elvis Presley (“Until It’s Time For You To Go”), among many others. Her protest song, “Universal Soldier,” became a modest hit for both Donovan and Glen Campbell. Her most recent album was 2017’s Medicine Songs.
In her statement about her decision to stop performing live, Sainte-Marie wrote, “I have made the difficult decision to pull out of all scheduled performances in the foreseeable future. Arthritic hands and a recent shoulder injury have made it no longer possible to perform to my standards. Sincere regrets to all my fans and family, my band and the support teams that make it all possible.”
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1 Comment so far
Jump into a conversationWell, what do you know. I was just listening to Glen Campbell’s “Universal Soldier” and I said to myself “Self, that has got to be a Phil Ochs song.” Was I ever wrong. Sorry, Buffy.