By, Darlene Mae Nowell O’Connor
Lana Hergert – Local Female Vocal Phenom Still Spinning Webs with Widow’s for those about to Rock!
Lana Hergert will take another little piece of your heart and make you feel good when the “Black Widow” performs for the crowd during “America’s Grape Country Craft Beverage Festival” on August 6th, 1pm at the Chautauqua County Fairgrounds in Dunkirk, New York. I can’t wait to find myself entangled in their web of music mastery and bitten by the razor-sharp precision of this award-winning and fiercely female vocal phenom.
While the band “Black Widow” has been rocking the southern tier and beyond for more than three decades, Lana Marie Hergert, the acclaimed lead singer, has been the tour de force behind much of the band’s success. Having been crowned Buffalo Music Scene’s, “Best Female Rock Vocalist” multiple times and having led “Black Widow” to claim over 50 Buffalo Music Award titles, for 35 years Lana has been the constant thread weaving together the talents of this high-profile, much sought after and beloved musical group. For the last 15 years she has considered the current lineup of musician’s her family and they are as follows: Nino Catanzarro, formerly of the Outlaws, brings the beat of the Bass Guitar, while Joe Dehlinger bangs it out on the Drums and Dustin Francis makes the lead guitar sing. In addition to her recognition as a local Rock Diva, she and Anthony Cascuccio hit the European Charts as A&L, an original, acoustic recording duet with titles that hovered around tracks put out by today’s music legends, such as, Adel.
This multi-talented and extremely versatile singer has the pipes to pump out hits from across the spectrum of genres and covering over four decades of chart-topping hits. From songs by the likes of Pat Benatar, Lady Gaga, Melissa Ethridge and one of Lana’s favorites, Janice Joplin; to the classic hits of: Steppenwolf, Journey, The Doors, Pink and so many more, Lana performs them all with authenticity and ease. When I asked Lana what she felt was the most important aspect to her performances, she answered without hesitation, connection. “If I couldn’t connect with the audience on the whole and with individuals who have come together to share in our experience as performers, there would be no purpose for my presence. I seek out those who may feel adrift to pull them in and assure them that they are not alone. Making people feel good about themselves while enabling them to forget about the stresses of life, is what motivates me to give 100% of what I’ve got each time I get behind the microphone. I absolutely love it when we bring someone out of the audience to sing or shake a tambourine with us on stage. They get to feel special, and they should because they are. We are all special in ways we don’t always recognize or see and when you have the opportunity to make another human being feel that it is really rewarding.”
I queried of Lana if she remembered when she was first bitten by the music spider. She recalls singing solos from grade school through high school and always knowing it was her destiny to be behind the mic, but that it was not always easy. She remembers being chastised and told her body size was too large to sing lead by a few bands, but soon she began filling in with Black Widow and History is made.
I am super excited to meet Lana Marie Hergert and the members of Black Widow on Sunday. I told her I would be the O.G. in hats, dancing like a fool while attempting to video their performance. I told her if she sees me on my knees in front of the bandstand, it is only so I can get the drummer in my lens. She chuckled and agreed to give me visual access and I am confident she will.
You can find out more about Lana @ LanaMarie.net and be sure to check out the band on the Black Widow Band Facebook page or contact them via email at Thewidow71@gmail.net or the link, blackwidowband.net.
I’ll see you all with hats or no hats, dancing shoes required, on August 6th at 1pm, at the Chautauqua County fairgrounds for a knock your socks off performance by, “Black Widow” featuring Lana Hergert, at the America’s Grape Country Craft Beverage Festival!
Lana agrees with me, “Life is short, DANCE”!