Our musicians continue to leave us . . .
On May 27th, 2017, news broke that Gregg Allman passed away. A week earlier, Chris Cornell passed. Admittedly, I’m not the biggest fan of either of these artists, though each created several excellent songs.
Like Chris Cornell, we lost many musicians before their time: for instance, Moon and Bonham. For me, these deaths occurred before I began listening appreciating their music, but their loss is still felt in the works that could have been but aren’t.
Now, Chris Squire, bassist for Yes, and Gary Richrath, guitarist for REO Speedwagon, hit hard. I’m a big fan of each group, and I enjoyed their music for years.
And there are many, many more, too many to mention here.
These losses took away masterful performances as well as the possible future pieces, pieces that could inspire me and future generations.
Music often inspires me. I tend to write with music playing: Yes, Pink Floyd, REO Speedwagon, and Genesis. Sometimes, I skew newer, towards Jewel, Alanis Morissette, Mumford and Sons, and The Cranberries.
And sometimes music makes its way into my writing. I took the opportunity in my upcoming book, The Music of Mars, to have a song inspire my main character. The song is Kansas‘s Dust in the Wind. I merely described the lyric’s meaning, not quoting them or even naming the song. I think the reader will have fun trying to guess the song. I suppose this post will either spoil or provide the answer to that small mystery.
We’ll mourn the loss and continue to enjoy the music–it’s a fine legacy for a musician.
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I’m an author living in northern Virginia with a wife and a cat. In the late ’80s, I worked on the International Space Station project. I recently retired from managing a group of software engineers to focus on writing science fiction and speculative fiction. Learn more.