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Love Songs To The D



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Allee Willis debuts her record-breaking
video at a party at the DIA.

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STORY AND PHOTOS BY JULIE YOLLES

DESIGNS IN DECORATOR WOOD & LAMINATES, LTD.

It Doesn't Have
To Cost A Fortune…
Only Look Like It!

Complete kitchen and
bathroom remodeling as well
as furniture design and
installations including granite,
wood and other materials.

D

o you remember, the 28th night of September? Love
was changing the mind of defenders. While chasing the
clouds away.
Multimedia artist Allee Willis — writer of many hits includ-
ing Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September,” “Boogie Wonderland” and
the theme from “Friends” — has been defending “The D” from
her kitschy Pepto-Bismol-pink house in North Hollywood, Calif.,
for more than 40 years.
“I love Detroit. It’s my favorite city in the world,” says the 1965
Mumford
graduate.
And she set out to prove just that five years ago when she
decided to write a song honoring her beloved hometown and
calling it Detroit’s “official, unofficial theme song.”
“I was so tired of
people saying bad
things about Detroit,”
says Willis, a Grammy,
Emmy, Tony and
Webby award-winner
and nominee who
does not know how
to read, play or notate
music.
So, she wrote,
arranged and pro-
duced “The D” with
Andrae Alexander and
got 5,000 Detroiters —
“the greatest number
of lead vocalists ever
assembled on one
recording” — to sing
West Bloomfield friends Andi Sklar, Bev Tepper-Wallace the song.
and Karen Gunsberg and Bloomfield Hills residents Les
Over the past five
and Lili Gold. Sklar sang at Temple Israel for the video, years, Willis flew back
and Les Gold and his son and daughter sang at his and forth 30 times

ABOVE: Jackie
Kallen of West
Bloomfield, former
Detroiter Allee
Willis and “The D”
co-writer and
co-producer
Andrae Alexander,
both of Los
Angeles.

American Jewelry & Loan Company in Detroit.

Lois Haron Allied Member ASID 248.851.6989

2152860

20

October 5 • 2017

jn

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