Dionne Warwick has been receiving attention for her Twitter activity during the COVID-19 pandemic, and the superstar is loving the sense of connection that social media provides between her and her fans of all ages.
The 80-year-old “That’s What Friends Are For” singer joined Twitter in 2012, but fans began taking note of her account in 2020 when she started asking some interesting and hilarious questions and sharing entertaining anecdotes.
The Grammy Award-winning artist, who credits her niece Brittani Warrick with introducing her to the platform, wasn’t ignorant, before joining and becoming active, of the negativity that exists on the platform. She was concerned about the way she observed young users talking to others and about themselves, and feels that through interacting with them, she’s providing the “grown-up intervention” and positivity that they need.
“When I first started doing this, I noticed too that, on Twitter, that it wasn’t always a pleasant thing with these kids. What was wrong with them? They were saying some pretty ugly things to each other, and about themselves,” she told Variety. “I really thought they could use a little grown-up intervention here. That’s why I think they’re responding to me. They’re getting to know me, They get that I’m not going to have anything other than good stuff come across, to me, about me, and to them. It’s so much easier to put a smile on someone’s face than a frown. That’s getting across to them, if you notice the correspondence I get back.”
Two notable artists who ended up caught in Warwick’s fun web of tweets were Chance the Rapper and The Weeknd, and the “Walk On By” singer says her interest in them both was just as random as it seemed. “It was out of the blue these two became of interest. Chance. That name. I was trying to figure out how I could poke a little fun at him,” she said. ” ‘We all know you’re a rapper. How come you have to put it in your name?’ It was just a fun thing to say to him, to see if he’d respond. And he did. Which was lovely.”
The Twitter conversation between the two sparked a friendship and working relationship. Fans now can look forward to an upcoming collaboration from the two. “Now, we’ve become very close, and we will be collaborating on a song,” she revealed. “Actually, he’s in the studio now, putting his part on our song. As soon as he is satisfied, he’ll send it to me and I’ll put my voice on the track. The same thing with the Weeknd. I just wanted to know why the kid just couldn’t put the E before the N. Why not just spell it out? And he responded to me.”
Since becoming acclimated to the network and gaining a different kind of fame there, Warwick appreciates that it has “given me a way to connect with people that I’m sure they’d never thought I’d connect with. And the lovelier thing is the responses I’m getting from them.”
