Patti Smith Reveals Shocking Truth About Father in New Memoir

Patti Smith got candid about the moment she discovered the truth about her biological father. 

The 78-year-old singer – who rose to fame in the 70s with her debut album Horses – opened up about the topic in her new memoir Bread Of Angels which officially hit shelves on Tuesday. 

The songstress was raised by her mother Beverly and a man named Grant – but on her 70th birthday the star learned that Grant had not been her biological father, per People. 

In the early 2000s before the shock revelation, the Grammy-nominated performer had a phone conversation with her mom who said that she had something to tell Smith ‘about genetics’ the next time they saw each other in person. 

However, her mother was hospitalized following a fall and looked at Smith ‘blankly’ when questioned about the previous genetics comment. 

Back in 2012, Smith and her sister Linda took DNA tests only to find out that they were instead half-siblings – causing the music artist to believe her father was actually her mom’s Uncle Joe. 

‘We wept,’ the star penned in her memoir in an excerpt obtained by People. ‘The results of our test put a great strain on my thought processes and for some time, I was unable to write.’

She also admitted that the discovery had made her ‘question the validity of what I had written.’ 

But both Smith and Linda additionally took an autosomal DNA test in order to learn about her mother Beverly’s genetic origins.

‘I had all but accepted the fact that I was fathered by my mother’s Uncle Joe, and fully expected the results to confirm it.’ 

But on the day she turned 70, Smith received the results which explained that her biological father was ‘100% Ashkenazi’ – a Jewish ethnoreligious group whose ancestors are from Central and Eastern Europe.

The singer’s daughter had a major role in helping her mother discover who her father was. At the age of 20, Smith put her eldest daughter up for adoption but the pair later reunited. 

Smith is also mother to children Jackson, 43, and Jesse, 35, whom she welcomed with late husband Fred ‘Sonic’ Smith. 

The singer’s daughter utilized the same skills she used to find Smith to also aid in learning about the star’s biological father.   

After learning of his name – Sidney – the performer also came across a photo of him and wrote, ‘I knew he was my father before I saw his face.’

Smith was able to find a first cousin and further learned that her father had passed away in 1965. His widow had also lived up until her own death in the 90s. 

The star opened up about the impact of learning the truth about her biological father and told People, ‘I wasn’t sure what to do with this information, because I wanted the book I was writing to be very truthful, and all of a sudden, I had a parallel truth.

‘And I felt if I didn’t write about it, then it felt like truth was compromised.’

But the Free Money songstress expressed that she ‘wanted to acknowledge him’ and added he was ‘someone that was barely remembered.’ 

‘He had no children. His surrounding family was small, and he’s not someone that would be remembered pretty much by anyone. So I wanted to rectify that.’  

Smith said that her mother and the man Grant who had raised her would ‘appreciate’ her mentioning Sidney in the latest book. 

She admitted, ‘I was sad to not be Grant’s biological daughter. I was sad to only have my sister, Linda, as a half sister, but in the end, it doesn’t matter. Our love for each other, my love for my father, eclipses blood, and my love for my sister eclipses blood.’

The singer explained that it took her some time ‘to really figure all this out, figure out how to present the story in the best light. I’ve met a lot of people where this has happened to them, and they have felt very angry and bitter. 

‘They feel like they were lied to, they feel angry at their mother and I thought maybe if I presented a different way to look at it, it would be helpful.’

Grant had notably appeared on Smith’s 2000 album cover for Gung Ho.

She further reflected on the discovery during a recent interview with CBS Mornings.

‘It was like when people say, “I never saw that coming.” I never saw it coming,’ she said, before adding it took her ‘a couple years’ to learn of her true biological father’s identity. 

‘The book took longer to write because I put it away for over two years because I had to process that and also I had to decide what do I do with that information. Do I hide it? 

‘But then I thought, you know one of the things – my goal when writing this book – was to give certain people that I love life.’

She added, ‘It’s a book of gratitude. And he gave me life with my mother. The two of them gave me life. How could I keep that a secret?’ 

Smith’s first memoir Just Kids was released in 2010 and had opened up about her relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe. 

The book garnered positive reception upon its release and landed on the New York Times bestseller list while also winning the 2010 National Book Award for Nonfiction. 

The cover for Bread And Angels had been taken by Mapplethorpe which she discussed to Vanity Fair back in August. 

‘Robert Mapplethorpe took this photograph at a deeply transitional moment,’ Smith explained. 

‘It was between the end of my public life as a performer and the beginning of my time in Detroit with my one true love, Fred ‘Sonic’ Smith. Robert had taken an image with doves for the cover of the album Wave.’ 

The star continued, ‘Afterwards, I asked him to take another that would reflect the sentiment of the song Dancing Barefoot, a love song for Fred and a farewell to the people. This is the photograph he took.’ 

The new memoir dives into Smith’s upbringing and her teenage years, as well as her start in the music industry and marriage to Fred Smith. 

‘In the final pages, we meet Smith on the road again, the vagabond who travels to commune with herself, who lives to write and writes to live,’ per an official description.