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Derek Jones from Falling in Reverse died April 21, 2020

Derek Jones (June 5, 1984 – April 21, 2020) was an American guitarist, best known as the rhythm / lead guitarist and co-lead vocalist for the post-hardcore band Falling in Reverse. He was also previously the guitarist of the band A Smile from the Trenches until he left in 2010. Derek Jones was born in Lake Forest, California. He first started playing the saxophone but switched to the guitar. As a teenager he formed and played in several bands and he had his first tour at 19 years old. In 2007, Derek Jones joined the band A Smile from the…
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Bassist Matthew Seligman died April 17, 2020

Matthew Seligman (July 14, 1955 – April 17, 2020) was an English bass guitarist, best known for his work with the new wave music scene of the 1980s. Matthew Seligman was born in Cyprus, and his family moved to Wimbledon, London, England when he was eight months old. He was inspired to learn bass by hearing the likes of Sir Paul McCartney, Andy Fraser from Free, and Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads. Matthew Seligman was a founding member of Bruce Woolley and the Camera Club, which also included his friend Thomas Dolby (English musician, producer, entrepreneur and teacher). He played…
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Jazz Saxophonist Lee Konitz died April 15, 2020

Lee Konitz (October 13, 1927 – April 15, 2020) was an American jazz composer and alto saxophonist. He performed in a wide range of jazz styles, including bebop, cool jazz, and avant-garde jazz. Lee Konitz’s association with the cool jazz movement of the 1940s and 1950s included him playing in the legendary Miles Davis’s “Birth of the Cool” sessions, and working with pianist Lennie Tristano. He was one of only a few alto saxophonists of his era to retain a distinctive style, when Charlie Parker exerted a massive influence on most others. Like other students of Lennie Tristano, Lee Konitz…
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John Prine, Folk Legend, died on April 7, 2020 from COVID-19 (coronavirus)

John Prine (October 10, 1946 – April 7, 2020) was an American country folk singer-songwriter. He was active as a composer, recording artist, and live performer from the early 1970s until his death, was known for an often humorous style of country music with elements of protest and social commentary, and was widely regarded as one of the most influential songwriters of his generation. John Prine was born and raised in the Maywood suburb of Chicago and started playing guitar at age 14. He attended classes at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk Music, and Proviso East High School in…
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Bill Withers died on March 30, 2020, aged 81

William Harrison (Bill) Withers Jr. (July 4, 1938 – March 30, 2020) was an American former singer-songwriter and musician who performed and recorded from 1970 until 1985. He recorded several major hits, including “Lean on Me”, “Ain’t No Sunshine”, “Use Me”, “Just the Two of Us”, “Lovely Day”, and “Grandma’s Hands”. He won three Grammy Awards and was nominated for four more. His life was the subject of the 2009 documentary film Still Bill. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015. Bill Withers was the youngest of six children and born in the small…
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Ellis Marsalis Jr, New Orleans jazz piano legend, died April 1, 2020

Ellis Louis Marsalis Jr. (November 14, 1934 – April 1, 2020) was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, and was a jazz pianist and educator. Although he was active since the late 1940s, Ellis Marsalis Jr came to greater attention in the 1980s and 1990s as the patriarch of a musical family, with his sons Branford Marsalis and Wynton Marsalis rising to international acclaim. Ellis Marsalis Jr played saxophone during high school but switched to piano while studying classical music at Dillard University, where he graduated in 1955 before attending graduate school at Loyola University New Orleans. In the 1950s and…
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Adam Schlesinger, Fountains of Wayne Singer, died March 31, 2020

Adam Schlesinger (October 31, 1967 – March 31, 2020) was an American singer-songwriter, record producer, and guitarist who won three Emmy Awards, a Grammy Award, and the ASCAP Pop Music Award, and was also nominated for Academy, Tony, and Golden Globe Awards. Adam Lyons Schlesinger was the son of publicist Barbara (née Bernthal) and Stephen Schlesinger and grew up in Manhattan and Montclair, New Jersey. He attended Montclair High School and went on to Williams College where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy. He was a founding member of the bands Fountains of Wayne, Ivy, and Tinted…
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Wallace Roney, US jazz trumpeter, died March 31, 2020

Wallace Roney (May 25, 1960 – March 31, 2020) was an American jazz trumpeter, born in Philadelphia. He was found to have perfect pitch at the age of four, and began his musical and trumpet studies at Philadelphia’s Settlement School of Music before going onto the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, in Washington, D.C, where he studied trumpet with Langston Fitzgerald of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. When he entered the Duke Ellington School, Wallace Roney had already made his recording debut at the age of just 15 with Nation and Haki Mahbuti, and at that time met, among others,…
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Joe Diffie, country music singer, died March 29, 2020

Joe Diffie (December 28, 1958 – March 29, 2020) was an American country music singer born into a musical family in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1958. After working as a demo singer in the 1980s, he signed with Epic Records’ Nashville division in 1990, and between then and 2004, Joe Diffie charted 35 singles on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart, five of which peaked at number one. These were his debut release “Home”, “If the Devil Danced (In Empty Pockets)”, “Third Rock from the Sun”, “Pickup Man” (his longest-lasting number-one song, at four weeks) and “Bigger Than the Beatles”. In…
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Alan Merrill died March 29, 2020

Alan Merrill (February 19, 1951 – March 29, 2020) was born Allan Preston Sachs and was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, actor and model. In the early 1970s, Alan Merrill was the first Westerner to achieve pop star status in Japan. He was the co-writer of, and lead singer on, the first released version of the song “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll”, which was recorded by the Arrows in 1975. Allan Preston Sachs (Alan Merrill) was born in The Bronx, New York City, to two jazz musicians, singer Helen Merrill and saxophone/clarinet player Aaron Sachs. Merrill was primarily a vocalist…
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