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Gavin Creel, an accomplished Broadway actor best known for his performance in Hello, Dolly!, has died. He was 48 years old. The star’s publicist told The Associated Press that Creel died at home in NYC after a two-month battle with metastatic melanotic peripheral nerve sheath sarcoma. Per Mayo Clinic, the rare form of cancer starts […]
Kris Kristofferson, a Rhodes scholar with a deft writing style and rough charisma who became a country music superstar and A-list Hollywood actor, has died.
Kristofferson died at his home in Maui, Hawaii, on Saturday (Sept. 28), spokeswoman Ebie McFarland said in an email. He was 88.
McFarland said Kristofferson died peacefully, surrounded by his family. No cause was given. He was 88.
Starting in the late 1960s, the Brownsville, Texas, native wrote such classics as “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down,” “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” “For the Good Times” and “Me and Bobby McGee.” Kristofferson was a singer himself, but many of his songs were best known as performed by others, whether Ray Price crooning “For the Good Times” or Janis Joplin belting out “Me and Bobby McGee.”
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He also starred opposite Ellen Burstyn in director Martin Scorsese’s 1974 film Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, starred opposite Barbra Streisand in the 1976 A Star Is Born and acted alongside Wesley Snipes in Marvel’s Blade in 1998.
Kristofferson, who could recite William Blake from memory, wove intricate folk music lyrics about loneliness and tender romance into popular country music. With his long hair and bell-bottomed slacks and counterculture songs influenced by Bob Dylan, he represented a new breed of country songwriters along with such peers as Willie Nelson, John Prine and Tom T. Hall.
“There’s no better songwriter alive than Kris Kristofferson,” Nelson said during a November 2009 award ceremony for Kristofferson held by BMI. “Everything he writes is a standard and we’re all just going to have to live with that.”
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As an actor, he played the leading man opposite Barbara Streisand and Ellen Burstyn, but also had a fondness for shoot-out Westerns and cowboy dramas.
He was a Golden Gloves boxer and football player in college, received a master’s degree in English from Merton College at the University of Oxford in England and turned down an appointment to teach at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, to pursue songwriting in Nashville. Hoping to break into the industry, he worked as a part-time janitor at Columbia Records’ Music Row studio in 1966 when Dylan recorded tracks for the seminal Blonde on Blonde double album.
At times, the legend of Kristofferson was larger than real life. Cash liked to tell a mostly exaggerated story of how Kristofferson, a former U.S. Army pilot, landed a helicopter on Cash’s lawn to give him a tape of “Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down” with a beer in one hand. Over the years in interviews, Kristofferson said that with all respect to Cash, while he did land a helicopter at Cash’s house, the Man in Black wasn’t even home at the time, the demo tape was a song that no one ever actually cut — and he certainly couldn’t fly a helicopter holding a beer.
In a 2006 interview with The Associated Press, he said he might not have had a career without Cash.
“Shaking his hand when I was still in the Army backstage at the Grand Ole Opry was the moment I’d decided I’d come back,” Kristofferson said. “It was electric. He kind of took me under his wing before he cut any of my songs. He cut my first record that was record of the year. He put me on stage the first time.”
One of his most recorded songs, “Me and Bobby McGee,” was written based on a recommendation from Monument Records founder Fred Foster. Foster had a song title in his head called “Me and Bobby McKee,” named after a female secretary in his building. Kristofferson said in an interview in the magazine, Performing Songwriter that he was inspired to write the lyrics about a man and woman on the road together after watching the Frederico Fellini film La Strada.
Joplin, who had a close relationship with Kristofferson, changed the lyrics to make Bobby McGee a man and cut her version just days before she died in 1970 from a drug overdose. The recording became a posthumous No. 1 hit for Joplin.
Hits that Kristofferson recorded include “Why Me,” “Loving Her Was Easier (Than Anything I’ll Ever Do),” “Watch Closely Now,” “Desperados Waiting for a Train,” “A Song I’d Like to Sing” and “Jesus Was a Capricorn.”
In 1973, he married fellow songwriter Rita Coolidge and together they had a successful duet career that earned them two Grammy awards. They divorced in 1980.
He retired from performing and recording in 2021, making only occasional guest appearances on stage.
Kathryn Crosby, who appeared in such movies as The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Anatomy of a Murder, and Operation Mad Ball before marrying famed singer and Oscar-winning actor Bing Crosby, has died. She was 90.
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She died of natural causes Friday (Sept. 20) night at her home in the Northern California city of Hillsborough, a family spokesperson said Saturday.
Appearing under her stage name of Kathryn Grant, she appeared opposite Tony Curtis in Mister Cory in 1957 and Victor Mature in The Big Circus in 1959. She made five movies with film noir director Phil Karlson, including Tight Spot and The Phenix City Story, both in 1955.
Her other leading men included Jack Lemmon in Operation Mad Ball, James Darren in The Brothers Rico, and James Stewart in Anatomy of a Murder, directed by Otto Preminger.
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Born Olive Kathryn Grandstaff on Nov. 25, 1933, in West Columbia, Texas, she graduated from the University of Texas with a degree in fine arts. She came to Hollywood and began her movie career in 1953.
She met Bing Crosby while doing interviews for a column she wrote about Hollywood for her hometown newspaper. They were married in 1957, when she was 23 and he was 54.
She curtailed her acting career after the wedding, although she appeared often with Crosby and their three children on his Christmas television specials and in Minute Maid orange juice commercials. She became a registered nurse in 1963.
In the 1970s, she hosted a morning talk show on KPIX-TV in Northern California.
After Crosby’s death at age 74 in 1977, from a heart attack after golfing in Spain, she appeared in stage productions of Same Time, Next Year and Charley’s Aunt. She co-starred with John Davidson and Andrea McArdle in the 1996 Broadway revival of State Fair.
For 16 years ending in 2001, she hosted the Crosby National golf tournament in Bermuda Run, North Carolina.
She is survived by children Harry, Mary, an actor best known for the TV show Dallas, and Nathaniel, a successful amateur golfer. She was married to Maurice Sullivan for 10 years before he was killed in a 2010 car accident that seriously injured Crosby.
Michaela DePrince, a powerful ballerina who appeared on Dancing With the Stars and in Beyoncé’s Lemonade film, has died. She was 29 years old. A cause of death was not revealed. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and news See latest videos, charts and news The devastating news was announced by her family via the dancer’s social media pages. “With […]
Tommy Cash, a country singer and the younger brother of Johnny Cash, has died. He was 84.
The news of Tommy’s passing was confirmed on Saturday (Sept. 14) in a social media post by the Johnny Cash Museum in Nashville.
“We are saddened to announce that the world lost a bright light last evening with the passing of Tommy Cash,” reads a statement on Instagram from Icon Entertainment CEO Bill Miller, who founded the museum.
A cause of death was not provided at press time.
Tommy died on Friday, just one day after the 21st anniversary of late country music icon Jonny Cash, who passed away on Sept. 12, 2003, from complications of diabetes.
“Tommy Cash was a loyal supporter of the Johnny Cash Museum and a very beloved member of our extended family as well as a highly respected member of the music industry,” Miller added. “This great man will be deeply missed by his friends and many loyal fans around the world. Please keep Tommy’s beloved wife, Marcy and his family in your prayers.”
Tommy was born in Dyess, Ark., on April 5, 1940. Following the artistic path of his older brother, Tommy enlisted in the U.S. Army and worked as a radio DJ for the Armed Forces, and later performed as a musician with Hank Williams Jr.‘s band.
Tommy’s solo music career began to take off after scoring his first record deal in 1965. Three years later, he released his debut album, Here’s Tommy Cash, and scored his first top 10 on Billboard‘s Hot Country Songs in 1970 with “Six White Horses,” a tribute to John F. Kennedy, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King. The track, which reached No. 4, was later covered by country great Waylon Jennings.
Tommy scored two more top 10 hits on Hot Country Songs in 1970 with “Rise and Shine” and “One Song Away.” He went on to perform as a musician over the decades, teaming up with his big brother Johnny on “Guess Things Happen That Way” in 1990.
“He performed around the world throughout his career, carrying on the Cash legacy long after his brother, Johnny Cash, passed in 2003,” Miller concluded in his statement.
See the Johnny Cash Museum’s announcement about Tommy Cash’s death on Instagram here.
Frankie Beverly, the honey-coated baritone frontman for the soul and funk group Maze, has died. He was 77. His family announced his Sept. 10 passing on Facebook Wednesday (Sept. 11). A cause of death has not been revealed. The post, signed by The Beverly Family, reads as follows: “Grieving the loss of a loved one […]
Mark Moffatt, the Australia-born, Nashville, TX-based guitarist, producer and engineer who worked on recordings by a long-list of important acts, from The Saints to Keith Urban, Tim Finn, Yothu Yindi and many others, died Friday (Sept. 6) following a year-long battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 74.
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Few Australian creatives can top Moffatt’s results in the studio. Moffatt was responsible for more tracks than another other single producer in the APRA Top 30 Australian songs, a list published in 2001 to celebrate the PRO’s 75th anniversary. And he produced a remarkable 15 ARIA Hall of Fame inductees.
Hailing from Maryborough, Queensland, he moved to Brisbane, then relocated to the U.K. to work on London’s Denmark Street for several years. When he found himself back in Brisbane in 1976, Moffatt slotted himself behind the desk producing The Saints’ “(I’m) Stranded,” a song that lit the powder keg that was the punk scene.
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Production stints with EMI and TCS Studios in Melbourne paved a way to Sydney in 1980, where Moffatt joined Festival Records as in-house producer, working on some of the biggest names in Australian music for more than a decade.
It was Moffatt who championed a young Keith Urban and produced Yothu Yindi’s hit “Treaty,” leaving a “rich catalog of success and an incredible legacy on the Australian and the global stage,” reads a statement from ARIA. “Mark gave life to sounds that defined generations.”
Moving to Nashville in 1996, Moffatt was APRA AMCOS’ inaugural Nashville member relations representative from his appointment in 2014, until he retired from the role in June 2024. During his time there, he was awarded the CMA Global Achievement Award.
The late music man “is without a doubt a legend of our industry and more importantly, a kind and wonderful person to have known,” reads a statement from APRA AMCOS.
At the time of his death, Moffatt was putting the finishing touches on an album for KILO, a band he formed with Australian rock singer John “Swanee” Swan.
“As much as Moffatt loved his music, his first love was his family,” reads a statement on his social page. He is survived by his wife, Lindsey, step-daughter Dana and two granddaughters, his son Geordie, and extended family in Australia.
A celebration of his life is being planned, with details to be supplied in due course.
Bass guitarist Herbie Flowers, who played with David Bowie, Elton John, Lou Reed and other music legends in a decades-long career, has died at 86.
The musician’s family confirmed his death on Facebook Saturday (Sept. 7).
“While we knew and loved him as Uncle Herbie, his musical contributions have likely touched your lives as well,” the husband of Flowers’ niece wrote. “He played bass on many of the songs from the golden age of rock,” the post reads.
A cause of death was not provided.
Flowers was a founding member of the pop group Blue Mink, who later joined the rock band T Rex. He won acclaim for his work with many of the biggest names in U.K. music in the 1970s, giving Reed’s “Walk on the Wild Side,” from the 1972 Transformer album, its recognizable twinned bassline.
He also played bass for Bowie’s “Space Oddity,” Bryan Ferry’s “The Bride Stripped Bare,” and Paul McCartney’s “Give My Regards to Broad Street,” and featured in two of John’s early ’70s albums, among many others.
In a tribute, Bowie’s estate wrote on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), “his work with Bowie and associates over the years is too long to list here.”
“Aside from his incredible musicianship over many decades, he was a beautiful soul and a very funny man. He will be sorely missed,” it said. “Our thoughts are with his family and friends.”
Tim Burgess, lead singer for The Charlatans singer, wrote X that Flowers “made the greats sound greater.”
Flowers also founded the instrumental rock band Sky in the late 1970s, releasing seven albums.
Will Jennings, the Oscar- and Grammy-winning co-writer of Titanic‘s “My Heart Will Go On” and other hit songs by Eric Clapton, Steve Winwood and Whitney Houston, has died. He was 80.
The superstar lyricist passed away Friday (Sept. 6) at his home in Tyler, Texas, his caregiver Martha Sherrod confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter. A cause of death was not provided, but Jennings had been experiencing health issues in recent years.
“A sad time, the passing of Will Jennings, a maestro, brilliant mind and a gentle spirit. It was an enormous honor to have worked with such a musical genius,” former J. Geils Band singer Peter Wolf, who collaborated with Jennings, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) Saturday.
During his career, the Songwriters Hall inductee co-wrote six songs that reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart: Barry Manilow’s “Looks Like We Made It” (1977); Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes’ “Up Where We Belong” (1982); Winwood’s “Higher Love” (1986); Houston’s “Didn’t We Almost Have It All” (1987); Winwood’s “Roll With It” (1988); and Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On” (1998).
Jennings also collaborated with Clapton on “Tears in Heaven,” which hit No. 2 on the Hot 100 and topped Billboard‘s Adult Contemporary chart for three weeks in 1992. The tribute to Clapton’s late son also earned the pair a song of the year trophy at the 35th annual Grammy Awards.
Jennings won best original song at the Academy Awards in 1983 for co-writing An Officer and a Gentleman‘s “Up Where We Belong” alongside Jack Nitzsche and Buffy Sainte-Marie. He took home the same honor in 1998 for the Titanic classic “My Heart Will Go On,” which he wrote-wrote with composer James Horner. The Dion-sung ballad also won a Grammy for song of the year.
Jennings was born in Kilgore, Texas, in 1944. Before hitting it big in songwriting, he was a professor at Tyler Junior College and later Austin State University, before teaching at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. His résumé also includes musical collaborations with superstars like B.B. King, Mariah Carey, Jimmy Buffett and Roy Orbison.
Jennings is survived by his wife, Carole, and his sisters, Joyce and Gloria.
Screamin’ Scott Simon, who spent 52 years as the pianist of the energetic rock ’n’ roll and doo-wop group Sha Na Na, died Thursday in Ojai after a long battle with sinus cancer, his daughter Nina Simon announced. He was 75.
A member of Sha Na Na from 1970 until they quit touring in 2022, Simon sometimes played the piano with his feet as he belted out such hits as Jerry Lee Lewis’ “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” and Danny & the Juniors’ “At the Hop.”
Simon and Sha Na Na performed in the 1978 film adaptation of Grease as “Johnny Casino and the Gamblers,” playing six doo-wop numbers in the high school dance scenes.
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Meanwhile, Simon partnered with Louis St. Louis to write “Sandy,” sung by John Travolta. The film’s soundtrack went on to become one of the top albums of all time, with sales of more than 30 million copies.
With the 1977 premiere of The Sha Na Na Show, Simon moved to Los Angeles and appeared on all 97 episodes of the 30-minute syndicated variety program over four seasons. The band welcomed such guest stars as Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, James Brown and the Ramones.
And on tour, Sha Na Na performed with acts including John Lennon & Yoko Ono, Steve Martin, Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel.
Born on Dec. 9, 1948, in Kansas City, Missouri, Simon was a multisport athlete and active in United Synagogue Youth, a national community of Conservative Jewish teenagers. He played in jug bands, founded a jazz quartet, tried his hand at composing and did song parodies, like turning Van Morrison’s “Gloria” into “Toriah.”
He moved to New York City to attend Columbia University — where a classmate nicknamed him “Screamin’ Scott” — in 1966 and fronted a blues band called The Royal Pythons.
In 1970, he answered an ad in the Columbia newspaper about an opening for a piano player and guitarist in a campus doo-wop group. Sha Na Na had immediately preceded Jimi Hendrix onstage at Woodstock in 1969 yet was still relatively unknown. After Simon graduated, he came aboard as its keyboardist and eventual managing partner.
While Sha Na Na primarily played classic ’50s and ’60s songs, Simon composed multiple songs and solo albums performed by the band and by himself on records and on TV.
In addition to his daughter, survivors include his wife, Deborah; another daughter, Morgan; stepson Nick; and granddaughters Rocket and Naomi.
This article was originally published by The Hollywood Reporter.