{"id":812033,"date":"2026-08-13T07:56:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-13T07:56:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/812033\/"},"modified":"2026-08-13T07:56:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-13T07:56:10","slug":"ritchie-blackmore-returns-to-the-stage-with-deep-purple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/812033\/","title":{"rendered":"Ritchie Blackmore returns to the stage with Deep Purple"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ritchie Blackmore<\/a> has returned to the stage with Deep Purple<\/a>. The 81-year old guitarist, who co-founded the band in 1968, joined them onstage at the 15,000-capacity Northwell at Jones Beach Theater in Wantagh, New York.<\/p>\n

Blackmore hadn’t played with the band since departing under acrimonious circumstances after a show in Helsinki, Finland, in November 1993, and his relationship with frontman Ian Gillan<\/a> has remained frosty.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

However, earlier this week, during an Instagram Live post, Blackmore revealed that he had reached out to Gillan to ask if he could appear at the show in Wantagh, a short drive from his home on Long Island.<\/p>\n

“I sent my A.I. pigeon to Ian Gillan<\/a> in Portugal, where he lives at the moment,” said Blackmore (as transcribed by Blabbermouth<\/a>). And I said, How would you feel about if I got up just for an encore? Just one of the songs. I don’t want to intrude. And I said, No pressure – just kind of [for] old times’ sake.’ I’m 81 now. So he seemed to love the idea, put it to the band, got a thumbs up, and it looks like we might be doing that.”<\/p>\n

And now they have. Blackmore joined Deep Purple onstage at the climax of a 100-minute set to perform Smoke On The Water<\/a>, a song powered by his most famous riff. After the song, Gillan told the story of Blackmore reaching out before introducing him.<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

“It was an absolute pleasure to have back on stage the founder member, the great legend, the immortal… Ritchie Blackmore!”, says Gillan. “It was a great pleasure. I’ll see you in the bar.”<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Blackmore’s partner, Candice Night, shared a photo of the six musicians huddled backstage, saying, “Well, this warms my heart.”<\/p>\n

The next show on Deep Purple’s Splat! tour, which arrives in Europe in late September, takes place August 13 at the Xfinity Center in Mansfield, MA. Full dates below.<\/p>\n

Ritchie Blackmore plays \u201cSmoke on the Water\u201d with Deep Purple 8\/12\/2026 Jones Beach Theater – YouTube
\n\"Ritchie<\/p>\n

Watch On <\/a>
\nDeep Purple: Splat! Tour 2026<\/p>\n

Aug 13: Mansfield Xfinity Center, MA
Aug 15: Halifax Scotiabank Centre, NS
Aug 17: Laval Place Bell, QC
Aug 18: Toronto RBC Amphitheatre, ON
Aug 19: Ottawa Canadian Tire Center, ON
Aug 21: Detroit Pine Knob, MI
Aug 22: Salamanca Seneca Allegany Casino, NY
Aug 24: Indianapolis Everwise Amphitheatre, IN
Aug 25: Highland Park Ravinia, IL
Aug 27: Prior Lake Mystic Lake Casino, MN
Aug 29: Winnipeg Canada Life Centre, MB
Aug 31: Calgary Scotiabank Saddledome, AB
Sep 02: Abbotsford Abbotsford Centre, BC
Sep 04: Lincoln Thunder Valley, CA
Sep 05: Mountain View Shoreline Amphitheatre, CA
Sep 06: Highland Yaamava Theatre, CA
Sep 08: Chula Vista North Island Credit Union Amp, CA
Sep 10: Las Vegas Planet Hollywood, NV
Sep 11: Long Beach Long Beach Amphitheater, CA
Sep 12: Sparks Nugget Event Center, NV<\/p>\n

Sep 29: Sofia 8888 Arena, Bulgaria
Oct 01: Cluj BT Arena, Romania
Oct 02: Budapest Laszlo Papp Arena, Hungary
Oct 04: Bratislava Tipos Arena, Slovakia
Oct 05: Vienna Stadthalle, Austria
Oct 07: Prague O2 Arena, Czechia
Oct 08: Lodz Atlas Arena, Poland
Oct 10: Belgrade Stark Arena, Serbia
Oct 11: Skopje Boris Trajkovski Arena, Macedonia
Oct 13: Athens Telekom Centre Arena, Greece
Oct 16: Zurich Hallenstadion, Switzerland
Oct 17: Milan Unipol Forum, Italy
Oct 19: Barcelona Sant Jordi Club, Spain
Oct 22: Paris Adidas Arena, France
Oct 23: Antwerp Lotto Arena, Belgium
Oct 25: Copenhagen Royal Arena, Denmark
Oct 26: Stockholm Avicii Arena, Sweden
Oct 28: Oslo Spektrum Arena, Norway
Oct 29: Gothenburg Scandinavium, Sweden
Oct 31: Leipzig QI Arena, Germany
Nov 01: Hamburg Sporthalle, Germany
Nov 03: Dortmund Westfalenhalle, Germany
Nov 04: Berlin Uber Arena, Germany
Nov 06: Frankfurt Festhalle, Germany
Nov 07: Nuremberg Arena, Germany
Nov 09: Amsterdam Ziggodome, Netherlands
Nov 10: Strasbourg Zenith, France
Nov 12: Bordeaux Ark\u00e9a Arena, France
Nov 13: Nantes Zenith, France
Nov 15: Lyon LDLC Arena, France
Nov 18: Newcastle Utilita Arena, UK
Nov 19: Glasgow OVO Hydro, UK
Nov 21: Birmingham BP Pulse Arena, UK
Nov 22: Manchester AO Arena, UK
Nov 24: London Eventim Apollo, UK
Nov 25: London Royal Albert Hall, UK<\/p>\n

Find Deep Purple tickets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ritchie Blackmore has returned to the stage with Deep Purple. The 81-year old guitarist, who co-founded the band…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":812034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[88],"class_list":["post-812033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/812033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=812033"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/812033\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/812034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=812033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=812033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=812033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}