Photo: Ian Tyson | From Kenny Vaughn on Fb: Ian Tyson. One of the greatest Western Cowboy singer/songwriter/poets of all time. I knew about Ian And Sylvia, but it wasn’t until I started hanging around The Oxford Hotel in Old Denver back in 1975 that I got hip to Ian. What a great artist. Chuck Pyle name checked Ian there one evening, and thanks to him, I picked up some of Ian’s albums. What a guy. RIP, Ian. Everyone should listen to ‘Four Strong Winds’ tonight and marvel at the greatness.
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Ian Tyson, Revered Canadian Folk Singer, Dies at 89
By Peter Applebome
An earlier version of this obituary misstated the name of one of Mr. Tyson’s albums. It is “Yellowhead to Yellowstone and Other Love Stories,” not “From Yellowhead to Yellowstone and Other Love Stories.”
Before Canadian musicians like Neil Young, Gordon Lightfoot, Joni Mitchell or Leonard Cohen, there was Ian Tyson.
Mr. Tyson, who began his music career as half of the folk-era duo Ian and Sylvia and went on to become a revered figure in his home country, celebrated both for his music and for his commitment to the culture of Canada’s ranch country, died on Thursday at his ranch in southern Alberta. He was 89.
His family said in a statement that he died from “ongoing health complications” but did not specify further.
Mr. Tyson — whose song “Four Strong Winds” was voted the most essential Canadian piece of music by the listeners of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation public radio network in 2005 — lived most of his life as both a rancher and a musician.
Performances of his songs like “Four Strong Winds” by Mr. Young, Johnny Cash and others, and “Someday Soon,” particularly by Judy Collins, made his music, if not always his name, well known in the United States.
But his persona as a weathered rancher-musician made him emblematic in Canada, much as Mr. Cash was on the other side of the border. He performed and ran the Tyson ranch south of Calgary well into his 80s, stubbornly keeping on despite the ravages of time, changing tastes, economic hardship and, for a while, the loss of his voice.
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Go here to read the rest of the tribute:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/entertainment/news/ian-tyson-revered-canadian-folk-singer-dies-at-89/
Eduardo Medina contributed reporting.
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Richard Ross, TV Producer and Musician, Dies at 70
By Pat Saperstein, Variety
Richard Ross, a longtime TV writer-director-producer and guitarist with the popular L.A. band Dick and Jane Family Orchestra, died of natural causes at home in Los Angeles on Nov. 24. He was 70.
Ross and his wife, Jane Cantillon, led the punk-meets-cabaret-meets-folk band Dick and Jane Family Orchestra, which played a wide array of gigs around Los Angeles and in other cities over many years, often donating their services to charitable events. The orchestra was the house band for a decade’s worth of Silver Lake’s annual National Night Out happenings and the Howl-O-Ween Doggie Costume Pageants.
The Los Angeles Times described their humor-inflected, eclectic sound as a “fast-moving, hit-and-run musical spree that’s quite unlike anything else in pop music.”
Ross was nominated for Emmy and DVDX awards as a TV and film producer, director and writer, and worked extensively as a director on “Unsolved Mysteries.”
Among his writing and producing credits were “Diabolical Women,” “Untold Stories of the ER,” “Alien Encounters,” “Crimes of the Century,” “Ancient Aliens,” “Unusual Suspects,” “Forecasting the End” and “Dinosaur Revolution.”
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He is survived by his wife, Jane and his stepdaughter, Genevieve.
Read the rest of the story here:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/music/news/richard-ross-tv-producer-and-musician-dies-at-70/ar-AA15P6VT?li=BBnb7Kz
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OTHER NOTABLE MUSICIANS’ DEATHS
Although we asked for prayers, Jeremiah Green, the drummer for Modest Mouse, did not make it. He passed away on December 31st. RIP, Jeremiah. Sending love for your smooth journey.
For the moment, deaths from COVID-19 seem to be on the descent, we are now losing many of our famous musicians to the effects of other medical issues such as diabetes and age. And it makes us sick to our stomachs to see so many young people dying from suicide, drug overdoses, and gun killings. If you want to know more about any of the musicians we lost, please check them out at http://www.wikipedia.com
January 2023
4: Zoran Kalezic, 72, Serbian-Montenegrin singer, lung cancer; Beeyar Prasad, 61, Indian lyricist (Kilichundan Mampazham, Njan Salperu Ramankutty, Vamanapuram Bus Route), complications from a stroke.
3: Notis Mavroudis, 77, Greek guitarist and composer, fall; Alan Rankine, 64, Scottish musician (The Associates).
2: Andrew Downes, 72, British classical composer’ Kingsize Taylor, 83, British singer and guitarist (Kingsize Taylor and the Dominoes).
1: Gangsta Boo, 43, American rapper; drug overdose; (Three 6 Mafia); Sebastian Marino, 57, American guitarist (Overkill, Anvil); Lázaro Valdés, 83, Cuban son and jazz musician; Fred White*, 67, American Hall of Fame drummer (Earth, Wind & Fire).
* Fred E. White (born Frederick Eugene Adams; January 13, 1955 – January 1, 2023) was an American musician and songwriter. He was one of the early members of Earth, Wind & Fire. He previously played drums on Donny Hathaway’s Live album.
Earth, Wind & Fire consisting of Fred White along with half-brother Maurice White, brother Verdine White, and other members were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000.
White died on January 1, 2023, at the age of 67.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_in_2023
December 2022
31: Jeremiah Green, 45, American indie rock drummer (Modest Mouse), cancer; Anita Pointer, 74, American singer (The Pointer Sisters), cancer; Pietro Spada, 87, Italian pianist and musicologist.
30: Don Williams*, 100, American traditional pop singer (The Williams Brothers).
* Donald J. Williams was born in Wall Lake, Iowa, on October 9, 1922. After The Williams Brothers broke up, Don Williams moved back to Los Angeles. In LA, he worked on TV shows, where he sang on the Eddie Fisher and Nat King Cole television shows. He put together his own act the “Don Williams Singers” and sang for a number of TV commercials. He also performed in a singing quartet group, The Masquers, with Burl Ives in a 1951 music video under “Snader Telescriptions” titled “Noah Found Grace in the Eyes of the Lord”. He was on The Andy Williams Christmas Show. He was an opening act at the new Tropicana Las Vegas hotel where he performed for two years. In 1958, he was in the musical show “Tropicana Holiday”. He then became an agent and manager. He united with his brothers yearly from 1962 to 1990 for The Andy Williams Christmas. Don Williams County Park in Iowa is named after him.
Don Williams died in Branson, Missouri, on December 30, 2022, at the age of 100.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Williams_Brothers#Don_Williams
29: Eduard Artemyev, 85, Russian composer (At Home Among Strangers, Solaris, Burnt by the Sun), People’s Artist of Russia (1999), complications from pneumonia; Margriet Eshuijs, 70, Dutch singer; Giovanni Pezzoli, 70, Italian drummer (Stadio); Ian Tyson, 89, Canadian singer (Ian & Sylvia) and songwriter (“Four Strong Winds”, “Someday Soon”).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deaths_in_2022
Ian Tyson, Revered Canadian Folk Singer, Dies at 89 // Richard Ross, TV Producer and Musician, Dies at 70 // Other Notable Musicians’ Deaths
