Deaths
- January 1 - Townes Van Zandt, country-folk musician, 52
- January 2 - Randy California, rock guitarist, 45 (drowned)
- January 5 – Burton Lane, composer and lyricist, 84
- January 10 – Kenny Pickett (The Creation), 54
- January 18 - Keith Diamond, songwriter, 46
- January 21 – Colonel Tom Parker, Elvis Presley's manager, 87
- January 22
- Richard Berry, songwriter (notably wrote "Louie Louie"), 61
- Billy Mackenzie, Scottish singer, 39
- February 10 – Brian Connolly, vocalist (Sweet), 51 (liver failure)
- February 23 - Tony Williams, jazz drummer, 51
- March 9 – The Notorious B.I.G., rapper, 24 (shot)
- March 10 - LaVern Baker, R & B singer, 67
- March 17 – Jermaine Stewart, vocalist, 39 (AIDS)
- March 24 – Harold Melvin, soul musician, 57
- [[April 8 – Laura Nyro, singer-songwriter, 49 (ovarian cancer)
- April 9
- Mae Boren Axton, songwriter and music promoter, 82
- Yank Rachell, blues guitarist, 87
- April 19 - Eldon Hoke, metal/punk singer and drummer, 39
- May 29 – Jeff Buckley, American singer-songwriter and guitarist, 30 (drowned)
- June 2 – Doc Cheatham, jazz trumpeter, 91
- June 4 – Ronnie Lane, member of The Small Faces, 51 (multiple sclerosis, pneumonia)
- June 7 - Arthur Prysock, jazz singer, 68
- June 16 – John Wolters (Dr Hook), 52 (liver cancer)
- June 19 - Bobby Helms, country singer, 63
- June 20 – Lawrence Payton (The Four Tops), 59
- June 24 – Prince Nico Mbarga, Nigerian highlife musician, 47
- August 1 – Sviatoslav Richter, pianist, 82
- August 2 – Fela Kuti, Nigerian musician and composer, 58 (Kaposi's sarcoma)
- August 5 - Don Steele, American disc jockey, 61
- August 10 – Conlon Nancarrow, composer, 84
- August 12 - Luther Allison, blues guitarist, 57
- August 16 – Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, qawwali singer and world music ambassador, 48
- September 5 – Sir Georg Solti, conductor, 84
- September 8 – Derek Taylor, press agent for The Beatles, 65
- September 18 – Jimmy Witherspoon, blues singer, 77
- September 19 – Rich Mullins, singer, 41
- October 12 – John Denver, American folk singer-songwriter and folk rock musician, 53 (air crash)
- October 19 – Glen Buxton, guitarist for the original Alice Cooper Band, 49 (pneumonia)
- October 20 - Henry Vestine, guitarist (Canned Heat), 52
- November 6 – Epic Soundtracks, English singer-songwriter, drummer of Swell Maps, Crime and the City Solution and These Immortal Souls, 38
- November 20 - Robert Palmer, writer, musicologist, clarinetist and producer, 52
- November 22 – Michael Hutchence, singer of INXS, 37 (hanging)
- December 1 – Stephane Grappelli, French violinist, 89
- December 2 - Michael Hedges, composer and guitarist, 43 (car accident)
- December 16 - Nicolette Larson, pop singer ("Lotta Love"), 45 (cerebral edema)
- December 19 - Jimmy Rogers, blues musician, 73
- December 28 – Henry Barraud, French composer, 97
- December 31 – Floyd Cramer, pianist, 64
Read more about this topic: 1997 In Music
Famous quotes containing the word deaths:
“On almost the incendiary eve
Of deaths and entrances ...”
—Dylan Thomas (1914–1953)
“There is the guilt all soldiers feel for having broken the taboo against killing, a guilt as old as war itself. Add to this the soldier’s sense of shame for having fought in actions that resulted, indirectly or directly, in the deaths of civilians. Then pile on top of that an attitude of social opprobrium, an attitude that made the fighting man feel personally morally responsible for the war, and you get your proverbial walking time bomb.”
—Philip Caputo (b. 1941)