Died On This Date (March 2, 2008) Jeff Healey / Blues Rock Great
themusicsover Jeff Healey
March 25, 1966 – March 2, 2008
Although he lost his site to retinoblastoma at just eight months, Jeff Healey would grow to become one of the greatest blues guitarists the world had ever seen. He could definitely hold his own alongside such greats as Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughan, and Buddy Guy. Beginning at age three, Healey would master the unusual style of playing his guitar flat on his lap. He would start his career in various jazz bands but would later dabble in blues rock with the release of his 1988 platinum debut album, See The Light. Throughout the years, he amassed a huge personal record collection that included a reported 25,000+ 78s, mostly made up of his true love, Jazz. Healey died of cancer on March 2, 2008, just a few weeks before the release of his tenth album, Mess Of Blues, his first rock album in eight years.
What You Should Own
Richard Pegue was a popular Chicago R&B radio disc jockey for the better part of forty years. He also penned a handful of R&B songs that managed to get recorded. Pegue was just eleven when he first took an interest to the broadcast medium, thanks to a reel-to-reel tape recorder that was given to him by his grandmother. By his teens, he was DJ’ing local parties and dances. Before long, Pegue was spinning records at radio stations throughout Chicago and Indiana. During the late ’80s he helped develop the popular “urban oldies” format. He continued working in radio into the 2000s. Richard Pegue was 66 when he passed away on March 2, 2009.
Mike Smith was the lead singer of the Dave Clark Five, the second British Invasion group to hit U.S. shores during the early ’60s. They would be the only competition for the Beatles until the Rolling Stones reared their ugly head and music lovers suddenly saw a whole new side to British pop music. After the Dave Clark Five disbanded in 1970, Smith continued to record and produce throughout the eighties and nineties and then enjoyed modest success on the oldies circuit through the early years of the 21st century. In 2003, Smith seriously injured his spinal cord in a fall at his home. The fall left him paralyzed from the waist down and in his arms. He passed away from complications of that fall in 2008, just two weeks shy of being inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Dave Clark Five.
