Visionary experimental folk musician Linda Perhacs, who has dementia, was checked out of her memory care facility in Los Angeles eight months ago, and her friends and colleagues have been unable to reach the family member overseeing her care.
Friends and longtime collaborators of folk musician Linda Perhacs, who grew up in Mill Valley, are publicly asking for help locating the 82-year-old singer-songwriter after learning she was removed from a Los Angeles residential care facility roughly eight months ago, as the Chronicle reports. Perhacs had reportedly been living with dementia before leaving the facility.
According to a statement shared Monday by several of Perhacs' closest associates, they've been unable to reach her directly since then, and repeated attempts to contact the legal guardian overseeing her care have gone unanswered.
A second statement posted Tuesday stressed that the group is not accusing anyone of misconduct, but they're instead trying to confirm that Perhacs is safe, comfortable, and receiving proper care after months without communication.
“The intention is not to intrude upon her privacy, but simply to ensure that she is safe and to re-establish communication with someone whose artistic contributions continue to resonate across generations,” reads the statement, emphasizing that Perhacs’ prolonged absence was concerning, as she’s considered “a beloved public figure.”
Page Six reports that producer Fernando Perdomo, who coproduced several of Perhacs' later albums, said he only learned about six weeks ago that she had been removed from the nursing home by her next of kin. Because of California privacy laws, he said staff could not tell him where she had been taken. Perdomo says he had previously been in contact with the family member, whom he believes may have since blocked him.
Perdomo told Page Six he filed reports with Adult Protective Services and the Los Angeles Police Department this week, in addition to contacting private investigators.
According to Entertainment Weekly, Perhacs was working as a dental hygienist in Los Angeles when one of her patients, Oscar-winning film composer Leonard Rosenman (East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, Barry Lyndon), heard her humming her own compositions and helped secure the record deal that led to her groundbreaking 1970 debut, Parallelograms.
Though the album received little exposure when it was released, Perhacs saw her career revived decades later after it was rediscovered and reissued, leading to two acclaimed comeback albums, The Soul of All Natural Things in 2014 and I'm a Harmony in 2017. She last performed publicly in Los Angeles in 2018.
“We toured the world, we played some major shows and she got some major press,” said Perdomo, speaking to Page Six. “One of the last things I remember her saying was, ‘I’m so thankful that I was able to make two more records and now I’m just resting.’”
Related: 79-Year-Old Peninsula Woman With Dementia Still Missing After Five Days
Image: Linda Perhacs/Facebook
