Died On This Date (June 24, 2010) JoJo Billingsley / Back Up Singer For Lynyrd Skynyrd
themusicsover JoJo Billingsley (Born Deborah Jo White)
1952 – June 24, 2010
JoJo Billingsley was a songwriter and vocalist who is perhaps best remembered as a member of the “Honkettes,” the so-nicknamed back-up singers for Lynyrd Skynyrd for nearly four years. Billingsley joined the group in 1975, touring the world during their peak years. That all came to a tragic end on October 20, 1977 when she was the only member of the band not killed in a plane crash that took the lives of Ronnie Van Zant, Cassie Gaines, Steve Gaines, Dean Kilpatrick (the band’s road manager) the pilot and co-pilot. Billingsley has always maintained that she had a dream that the plane would crash just two nights prior and tried to stop the others from taking it. The accident lead her to devote her life to the Lord as both a singer and later, minister. In 2006, she reunited with the then-current members of Lynyrd Skynyrd at a their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She also performed with members of the group at occasional charity or memorial events in recent years. Jojo Billingsley was 58 when she died of cancer on June 24, 2010.
Thanks to Craig Rosen of Number1Albums for the assist.
Francis Dreyfus was a successful French music producer, publisher and label head for many years. As a publisher, he signed the likes of Cat Stevens, David Bowie, and Pink Floyd to his Francis Dreyfus Music. He mostly specialized on electronic and jazz music on his labels, Disques Dreyfus, Disques Motors, and Dreyfus Jazz. His most notable discovery was electronic pioneer, Jean-Michel Jarre. Dreyfus published his first recordings and released his groundbreaking Oxygene on his label. Other notable artists he signed over the years included jazz greats, Marcus Miller and Alan Stivell. He was also a one-time president of SPPF, a French rights society. His was the father of popular French actress, Julie Dreyfus. Francis Dreyfus was 69 when he passed away on June 24, 2010.
Dave Carpenter was a much respected jazz bassist who, most recently was playing in a trio alongside Peter Erskine and Alan Pasqua. Born in Dayton, Ohio, Carpenter first took up the trumpet but switched to bass by his early teens. After graduating from college, he played with three of jazz’s then living greatest talents, 
Steven Wells was a British music journalist whose aggressive writings appeared in respected music magazines like NME. During the late ’70s and early ’80s, he touted the greatness of such punk acts as Black Flag and Butthole Surfers and the Mekons. For a time, Wells was also a stand-up comic, supporting such acts as Gang Of Four and the Fall. In 1992, Wells co-formed a video production company, directing videos for the likes of Manic Street Preachers and Skunk Anansie. Steven Wells died of Hodgkin’s Lymphoma at the age of 48.