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Singer Bette Smith Shows It’s Never Too Late For A Leap Of Faith

Courtesy of Shervin Lainez
Brooklyn's own Bette Smith makes a splash with her Southern-style soul debut 'Jetlagger,' out now through Fat Possum/Big Legal Mess records.

Bette Smith sang in her church choir and for a while church music was all she knew. She wasn't allowed to listen to secular music. Smith was raised Seventh-day Adventist, and her father encouraged solely religious music at home and in church where he directed the choir. But the family lived in a diverse neighborhood in Brooklyn, where the sounds of the South were too hard to avoid.

Smith was drawn to soul music, however she spent years telling herself singing professionally just was not an option. After three of her family members passed, she did some deep soul searching and finally decided to pursue her dream. Now she is bringing her delta-style soul-rock mix to North Carolina as part of her international tour for her newest album “Jetlagger.”

Bette Smith and her band perform at The Bullpen in Durham on Saturday, June 7, at THE BLOCK off biltmorein Asheville on Monday, June 11, and at The Rooster’s Wife in Aberdeen, on Wednesday, June 13. Ben Palmer joins Smith on guitar and vocals for a live studio performance.

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Laura Pellicer is a digital reporter with WUNC’s small but intrepid digital news team.
Longtime NPR correspondent Frank Stasio was named permanent host of The State of Things in June 2006. A native of Buffalo, Frank has been in radio since the age of 19. He began his public radio career at WOI in Ames, Iowa, where he was a magazine show anchor and the station's News Director.