Bruce Springsteen he has never shied away from explaining the ups and downs of his personal life in his deeply confessional songs.
The legendary rocker whose life and career inspired the 2025 biopic Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nothingstarring Jeremy Allen White – drew inspiration from his live love in his songwriting from the early days of his career, including his 1978 classic “Candy’s Room” about a tempestuous fling with the artist. Now Bihari.
A marriage with an actress Julianne Phillips coincided with the height of Springsteen’s popularity in the mid-1980s, but their relationship was short-lived and the musician channeled his disappointment on his soulful 1987 album. Tunnel of Love.
Springsteen officially reunited with the E Street Band member Patti Scialfa shortly after his first marriage broke up and they have been together ever since. The couple share three children: sons Evan and Samuel, and daughter Jessica.
MFleetwood Mac is perhaps the most famous example of bandmates finding each other, and the complications that come with it. “I broke up with Lindsey (Buckingham) in 1976. We had only been in Fleetwood Mac for a year and a half, and we broke up when we joined Fleetwood Mac,” recalled Stevie Nicks (…)
Keep scrolling to see Springsteen’s two marriages:
Who did Bruce Springsteen date before his first marriage?
Some of Springsteen’s early relationships are documented, including being with the actress Joyce Hyser for four years in the 1980s.
Springsteen Dated Photographer Lynn Goldsmith and model Karen Darwinalthough his most notable early relationship was with Now Bihari. In 2002, he said The National Inquirer that Springsteen wrote his rollicking Darkness on the edge of the city song “Candy’s Room” about his love life.
“The lyrics described my little apartment, what we were talking about, when we kissed,” she recalled. “It was the most romantic thing anyone had ever done for me. Bruce wasn’t all over the place making out with all these girls, and that’s what I loved about him.”
In the mid-1980s, Springsteen began performing with guitarist Patti Scialfa as part of his E Street Band. The two reportedly became close over the course of the Born in the USA Tour, before Springsteen abruptly married someone else.
When did Bruce Springsteen marry Julianne Phillips? How long were they together?
Julianne Phillips met Springsteen in late 1984 and married him just seven months later at Our Lady of the Lake Catholic Church in Lake Oswego, Oregon, in May 1985.
The couple’s significant age gap (Springsteen was 11 years older than Phillips) was frequently fueled by the press throughout their four-year marriage.
Phillips never really talked about what caused his marriage to break up, although Springsteen’s 1987 album Tunnel of Love it was suspected to have been inspired by the couple’s troubled relationship. Songs like “Brilliant Disguise” and “One Step Up” reflected Springsteen’s growing discomfort with his personal life and openly questioned whether it was possible to love unconditionally.
“One evening, as I sat across from my beautiful wife in a fancy restaurant in Los Angeles, a silent conversation formed inside my head. There, as we chatted politely by candlelight, hand in hand, a part of me tried to convince me that she was simply using me to advance her career or to achieve…something,” he wrote in his 2016 memoir. “Nothing could have been further from the truth. Julianne he loved me and he didn’t have an exploitative (sic) or malicious bone in his body. Inside, I knew it, but I was outside where the buses don’t run and I couldn’t focus on the truth.”
Bruce Springsteen and Julianne Phillips.
Ron Galella Collection/Ron Galella via Getty ImagesThe newlyweds soon faced a more serious complication beyond Phillips’ Hollywood career. Springsteen confirmed in his autobiography that he fell in love with bandmate Scialfa while still married to Phillips.
“Patti was a musician, he was about my age, he had seen me on the road in all my costumes and looked at me with a knowing eye,” he wrote. “She knew I wasn’t a white knight (perhaps a dark gray knight at best), and I never felt the need to pretend around her.”
The musician continued: “I reached out to Julie as soon as I knew how serious Patti and I were, but there was no decent or graceful way out. I was going to hurt someone I loved, period… I dealt with Julie and my breakup abysmally, insisting that it remain a private matter, so we didn’t put out a press release, causing furor, pain and a new situation. more heartbreaking I cared deeply for Julianne and her family and my mishandling of it is something I regret to this day.”
Phillips filed for divorce in California in August 1988, citing “irreconcilable causes” as the reason for the separation. Their divorce was finalized the following year.
When did Bruce Springsteen marry Patti Scialfa? What did he say about his marriage?
Springsteen and Scialfa caused a major scandal with their decision to live together shortly after their separation from Phillips.
“It’s a strange society that assumes it has the right to tell people who to love and who not to love,” he said. The Lawyer in 1995. “But the truth is, I basically ignored it as much as I could. I was like, ‘Well, all I know is that this feels real, and maybe I’m messed up here in some ways, but that’s life.’
Scialfa gave birth to her and Springsteen’s first child, son Evan, in July 1990. In June 1991, Springsteen married Scialfa in a private ceremony at their home in Los Angeles.
The two continued to work together professionally as they expanded their family throughout the 1990s. Their daughter, Jessica Rae, arrived in December 1991, and their youngest son, Samuel, was born in January 1994.
Patti Scialfa and Bruce Springsteen.
Amy Sussman/Getty ImagesSpringsteen said in London The Times in October 2024 that he and Scialfa made a decision early in their marriage not to “expose” their children to their success.
“When they were kids, if they heard me on the radio, they’d say, ‘Bruce Springsteen!'” he joked. “It was their way of separating their father from this abstract character who also seemed to be a part of their lives. A lot of times, we just didn’t expose them.”
talking with variety in 2017, Springsteen reflected on how his marriage to Scialfa managed to stand the test of time.
He may be “The Boss” now, but Bruce Springsteen has worked for decades to achieve icon status. The “Born in the USA” singer has had a long and successful career in the music industry, scoring 12 top 10 hits on the Billboard Top 100 along with his E Street Band. Thank you! (…)
“We’ve developed a kind of natural boundaries. Some places we have a more professional approach, like if I go into the studio while she’s working, I have certain boundaries where if she asks for my opinion or asks for my help, I give it at a very professional level,” he explained. “When he’s on stage with the E Street Band, he’s a member of the E Street Band, and when we’re off stage we’re husband and wife.”
The duo performed regularly together as part of the E Street Band in the late 2010s, before Scialfa took a extended tour break to seek treatment for multiple myeloma, a form of blood cancer. the duo reunited on stage for a moving duet at the Sea.Hear.Now Festival in Asbury Park, New Jersey in September 2024.