Bruce Springsteen and his wife, Patti Scialfaprotected her three children from his superstardom when they were younger.

In a recent interview with The timesSpringsteen, 75, opened up about why he and Scialfa, 71, didn’t initially expose their children – Evan, 34, Jessica, 32, and Samuel, 30 – to his fame.

“When they were little, when they heard me on the radio they would say, ‘Bruce Springsteen!'” he remembers. “It was her way of separating her father from this abstract figure who also seemed to be a part of her life. A lot of times we just didn’t expose them to it.”

Springsteen continued, “They came to concerts a few times before returning to their rooms to play video games and didn’t know much about it, other than what they might have read.”

Related: Timeline of the relationship between Bruce Springsteen and his wife Patti Scialfa

Bruce Springsteen found his “Jersey Girl” in his wife Patti Scialfa. “We have been together for 30 years. That’s a long time – they’ve shared a lot,” Springsteen gushed during an appearance on CBS Mornings in October 2019. “You know, Patti was the center of my life for the entire second half of my life… and (…)

As the children grew older, they began to get more involved and “wanted to bring their friends” to see their father perform. “But other than that, they chose their own lives, developed their own work, created their own partners and families, all at a comfortable distance from the strangeness of my job,” he added.

Springsteen’s stage performance also remained at a distance from his marriage. “As soon as I leave the stage, I’m the chauffeur taking the kids to school at 6 a.m.,” he teased.

Springsteen and Scialfa tied the knot in 1991, a year after giving birth to their first son, Evan. The couple had a long history before their relationship eventually turned romantic. (Scialfa has been a member of Springsteen’s E Street Band since 1984.)

“I’ve known Pats off and on since she was 17, and we had a steady relationship as friends until we met as a couple in 1988, when I was 38 and she was 34,” Springsteen said The times. “It worked out pretty well…except for the fact that I tend to take up a lot of space.”

Despite being one of the most famous names in music – Springsteen has sold more than 140 million records worldwide and won 20 Grammy Awards over his decade-long career – the boss previously admitted his children were never his biggest fans.

“They had their own musical heroes, they had their own music that interested them,” he said The New York Times in 2023 and joked that Evan, Jessica and Samuel tended to show “a healthy disinterest” in his career. “You would be pretty expressionless if someone mentioned a song title of mine.”

For Springsteen, the lack of interest was a positive sign. “I always saw it as saying that we did a good job. … I know a lot of kids who don’t mind 50,000 people booing their parents. But I don’t know how many would want these people to cheer on their parents,” he teased. “It’s just not right!”

Springsteen’s family has been in the spotlight for years, and fans were recently given a new glimpse into their lives when Scialfa revealed in 2018 that she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. The revelation came in the documentary Rock Diary: Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Bandwhich premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September.

“They caught it early and she has really good doctors who helped her a lot. But it tires them out a lot, and that’s a problem,” Springsteen said The times. “I’m doing a three-hour show, which is tiring for me and I’m in pretty good health. But she was great.”

He continued: “We found out that she can come out and sing a few songs and it’s important that the fans know what’s going on because they haven’t seen her in five years.” Patti decided that she did owed her audience.”