Category: obituary

Paul Bley 1932-2016

  • January 4, 2016
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We’ve lost quite a few great people this week: the singer Natalie Cole, cinematographers Vilmos Zsigmond and Haskell Wexler, Harlem Globetrotter Meadowlark Lemon, and now pianist Paul Bley— word is, he passed away while listening […]

Jacques Delécluse 1933-2015

  • October 31, 2015
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The French percussionist Jacques Delécluse has passed away. I frankly didn’t know he was alive; we worked out of his book Méthode de Caisse-Claire in college, and those French-published books present themselves with such authority […]

Jack Bruce 1943-2014

  • October 25, 2015
  • 2

UPDATE: Someone has helpfully pointed out that this happened in 2014, and that the current year is indeed 2015, and I am a complete stoner. I wish I could blame it on Oregon’s now-quite-legal recreational marijuana, […]

Rowdy Roddy Piper 1954-2015

  • August 1, 2015
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UPDATE: Notice in Rolling Stone. This one’s a real heartbreaker— Portland-based pro wrestling icon Rowdy Roddy Piper has passed away. Years ago he was a regular on Portland Wrestling, an iconic Oregon TV program in […]

Vic Firth 1930-2015

  • July 28, 2015
  • 1

By now everyone knows Vic Firth has passed away. I don’t know what to say about it, except that he wasn’t just a gear manufacturer, he was also a musician, and made major contributions to […]

Two performers

  • July 18, 2015
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Dave Camp Just had an acquaintance, and fellow Portland musician die this week— Dave Camp, a very talented, charismatic, rock & roll guitarist, singer, and songwriter. I think he was a couple of years younger […]

Phil Austin 1941-2015

  • June 21, 2015
  • 0

Very sorry to hear we lost another comedy legend last week: Phil Austin, from the Firesign Theater— an incredible surrealist satire troupe, if you don’t know them; they’re really the American Monty Python. Austin was […]