Jeff Hannerman – Lead guitarist and a founding member of thrash rock innovators Slayer, died of liver failure after being bitten by a spider, at the age of 49. The 1980s progenitors of all things thrash came up thru the ranks of metal to join Metallica as a pinnacle of cool heaviness.
Chris Kelly – Half of tween hip hop sensation Kriss Kros is a lesson in what can happen when the bottom falls out. Dead at 34 from an overdose
Deanna Durbin – Sweetly voiced teen movie star from the 1930s and 1940s who made her money tenting not a million miles away from Judy Garland, she could sound both light airy but heartfelt at the same time. Listen to “Any Moment Now”. Â She died at the age of 91… which I no longer consider THAT OLD.
Don Shirley – Immensely talented, classically trained pianist who composed for jazz and pop, and all but invented the remix by reworking songs so thoroughly they became his own. I guess he was the Nick Lowe of jazz. Shirley died at the age of 86
Shamshad Begum – Indian woman singer who would be recorded but not appear in films,being only used in playbacks. She was fluent in many different dialects and is still played and revered. Â According to Wikipedia: “singing over 6,000 songs in Hindi and the Bengali, Marathi, Gujarati, Tamil and Punjabi languages.” Pretty amazing, right? She was 94 years old and would have needed to be.