A Righteous Brother played here

Luis Pena

Longtime Newport Beach resident Jeri Lofland fondly remembers her

departed friend Bobby Hatfield of the Righteous Brothers.

Lofland had a yard sale one summer day in Dover Shores during the

early 1970s, and one of the many people who attended was a man in his

30s by the name of Bobby Hatfield. After the yard sale was long over,

he kept coming to her house.

Lofland and Hatfield hit it off, and a friendship between them

developed. They both had many things in common, she said: they had

the same friends and were both members of the Balboa Bay Club.

Hatfield liked her two-car garage and asked if he could keep his

collectible car in it. She relented after a while. One time, when he

came into Lofland’s home, he went into her daughter Lesley’s studio

room, saw a piano and began playing it.

“Next thing I know, he wanted to know if he could write some music

[at my home], which was OK,” Lofland said.

One of the reasons Hatfield enjoyed playing that piano was because

it had silent keys that toned down the noise, which would allow the

piano player to hear only the notes that were being played. Lofland

said that Hatfield would come in at night with his paper and gold pen

to write music using the piano.

He wrote the hit song “Rock and Roll Heaven” at the piano with the

silent keys, and it became the comeback reunion hit for the Righteous

Brothers after their breakup.

Hatfield and Lofland remained good friends because of his

relationship with Lofland’s daughter.

Hatfield confided in her about what he was doing in his life,

including music and show business.

“I liked him a lot,” Lofland said. “He was like a part of my

family.”

He was like a surrogate big brother to her daughter and would make

sure that she was all right.

“He was very mellow, just the way that he was singing; that’s the

kind of person that he was,” Lofland said.

The last time that she heard from Hatfield was about 15 years ago.

“He will be on our minds with his music in the background,” Lofland

said.