Died on this day ...

[Ruby]

David Garrick, otherwise known as David Byron died on this day in 1985, at the age of 38 from too much of a good thing. The voice of early Uriah Heep, until his eventual dismissal – and what a voice he had.

[video=youtube;TH6r0GtuKMA]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TH6r0GtuKMA[/video]

[Ruby]

Sergei Prokofiev died on this day in 1953, on the same day as Stalin – he was 61. Regarded as one of the greatest composers of the 20[SUP]th[/SUP] century – he was prolific and successful.

I like what ELP did to his Dance of the Knights, from Romeo and Juilet …

[video=youtube;xN1ZxRMuMt4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xN1ZxRMuMt4[/video]

[Ruby]

Lew Soloff died on this day in 2015 – he was 71. He was the trumpeter and flugelhorn player for Blood, Sweat and Tears between 1969 and 1973. He also led his own outfits and collaborated with the likes of Michael Franks, Paul Simon, Stanley Turrentine, George Benson and many others.

From Wiki: “He was among a handful of trumpeters capable of playing demanding lead trumpet parts while also contributing improvisational solos, and of playing (as musicians refer to it) "legitimate" music (baroque, classical, and later orchestral and chamber music styles) making him an in-demand session player for commercials and soundtracks.”

This is worth a listen, IMHO – the man put a different spin on the trumpet, that’s for sure! – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3evSIQ15Zbw

… and the most recognizable (at least, to me) of Blood, Sweat & Tears’ tracks …

[video=youtube;Cb5EBAP6zPY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cb5EBAP6zPY[/video]

[Ruby]

Andy Fraser died on this day last year – he was 62. He was one of the original members of the band Free, joining them at fifteen years of age. He was the bass player but could pretty much turn his hand to anything, including songwriting which he did very successfully for Robert Palmer, Rod Stewart, Paul Young, Joe Cocker and Chaka Khan.

He wrote “All Right Now” which was a major hit for Free – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siMFORx8uO8

I like this one, from the same album, Fire and Water, which is one he didn’t actually write – just played …

[video=youtube;ygKCRB_Yrwo]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygKCRB_Yrwo[/video]

[Lovely Linda]

[video]https://youtu.be/v1pFpQXRJLw[/video]

I liked Frank Jr. He was a good singer when he was young....RIP Frank :frown:

[Ruby]

Felix Pappalardi died on this day in 1983. He was ‘accidentally’ shot in the neck by his wife, Gail Collins, at 06h00 in the morning while he was supposedly giving her lessons on how to use the firearm, in bed, in his underwear, with a shredded marriage certificate in the waste basket, after having returned from an all-night tryst with a new love interest ... yeah, right. The jury came back with a verdict of criminally negligent homicide, much to the judge’s disgust – he reprimanded them, reminding them the first thing Mrs P had done was phone her lawyer, not the emergency services or the police. She served two years of her four year sentence, was then paroled, and eventually slunk out of sight for the rest of her life.

Pappalardi was a superior musical being according to accounts of those who knew and worked with him … he was a talented producer as well as performer (until the lifestyle got him - very messy in the end, and he'd gone a bit deaf from being in front of huge banks of speakers for countless hours), known for his work with Cream and sometimes referred to as the fourth member of the band. He was also the bassist for, and along with Leslie West, a founding member of Mountain –

[video=youtube;-dk2EeOR5m4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dk2EeOR5m4  [/video]

[Jerome]

A Hollywood script writer could not have come up with a more surreal plot. Marriage sure can be a pain in the neck............

[CRAZY-HORSE]

Its as surreal and unlikely as Oscar Pistorius' story IMO.

[CRAZY-HORSE]

Steve Marriott:
died in 1991 aged just 44...
founding member of my favourite band from the 1960s...Small Faces, and also founding member of Humble Pie (with Frampton)...
at just shy of 160cms in height he was a diminutive figure with a powerful voice who is revered by the likes of Paul Stanley (KISS),
Ozzy Osbourne, Jimmy Page,Steve Perry (journey) and Paul Weller to name a few...
he recorded with the likes of Rolling Stones, The Herd, Del Shannon, Donovan, Traffic, Chris Farlowe, Easybeats, New York Dolls, Mott The Hoople
to drop a few names...
he was Jimmy Page's first choice to front Led Zeppelin, but he turned it down to form Humble Pie...
by the early 1980s he went solo after disagreements with Frampton over Marriotts excessive use of alcohol and cocaine, by 1990 he had cleaned up his act and was on speaking terms with Frampton again and they reformedHumble Pie and released an album...
things were looking up for Marriott once again for a short while...
Marriott once again fell off the wagon and once again began his indulgences with cocaine and drink...
his wife left him, he broke his wrist just prior to going out on tour again...
he died after falling asleep in bed and his lit cigarette caused a fire which killed him...
fireman on the scene believe the fire/smoke woke him up but in the confusion of the heat and smoke he became disorientated and instead of heading towr\ards
his bedroom door he headed in the opposite direction and was trapped by the fire...
here's my favourite track by The Small Faces as a tribute to the late, great Steve Marriott:

[video=youtube;3rLF-QAS67I]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3rLF-QAS67I[/video]

[Ruby]

Andrew Gold died on this day in June 2011 – of heart failure - he was 59. Multi-instrumentalist, singer/songwriter, session musician, producer, sound engineer, film music composer, actor and artist! Quite a lot to cram into a mere 60 years. He wrote “Thank You for Being a Friend”, which was used as the theme song for the TV series Golden Girls – he also collaborated with a vast array of fellow musos and was the lead singer of Wax, a band he formed with Graham Gouldman, formerly of 10cc.

“Lonely Boy” was a top ten hit in the USA - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boAv-Bu4MrI

… and this one, with which he struck gold in the UK, boasts an uncredited Freddie Mercury on backing vocals –

[video=youtube;DNCx7LDv7Ng]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNCx7LDv7Ng[/video]