Artist tributes

R.I.P Bill Withers

  BILL WITHERS – SOUL LEGEND RIP It is with great sadness that we at Soul Brothers pay tribute to the passing of yet another legend. Bill Withers passed away on Monday 30th March from heart complications. He was 81. Born on the 4th July 1938 in Slab Fork, a mining town in West Virginia, […]

Tribute to Joe Fields – Muse Records founder

Joe Fields – Unsung Jazz Hero  Sadly veteran Jazz label owner and Producer Joe Fields died on 12th July aged 88. Joe had been in the jazz music business for over 50 years. He worked for London, MGM, Verve, Sue and Prestige labels. In 1968 when Sales Executive for Buddah records he founded their Jazz […]

Tribute to Chuck Loeb

Chuck Loeb – Smooth Jazz guitarist par excellence It is with great sadness that we learned of the passing of guitarist Chuck Loeb on 31st July from cancer. He was 61. Check was born in Nyack, New York in 1955, he grew up listening to Rock music and was impressed by artists like Jimi Hendrix, […]

DAVE VALENTIN – LEGENDARY JAZZ FUNK FLAUTIST RIP

DAVE VALENTIN – LEGENDARY JAZZ FUNK FLAUTIST RIP Latin Jazz Fusion flautist Dave Valentin passed away on Wednesday 8th March 2017 following a stroke.  He had also been suffering from Parkinson’s disease.  Dave Valentin was born in the Bronx to Puerto Rican parents on 29th April 1952.   He attended the High School of Music […]

Tribute to Leon Ware

LEON WARE THE ETERNAL ROMANTIC   Another week and another legend leaves us.  Master songwriter, producer and stylish singer, Leon Ware passed away on Thursday 23rd February; he was 77.  He was born and raised in Detroit in 1940, the youngest of eleven children.   Leon may not be a household name, however, the artists […]

Al Jarreau – singer, songwriter, performer extrordinaire and absolute gentleman passes

Sadly, yet another Soul/ Jazz superstar has passed away.  The legendary Al Jarreau died on Sunday 12th February.  He was 76.  Jarreau was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on 12th March 1940.  The fifth of six children, he was the son of a church minister and a church pianist.   A church in which he and his […]

Sharon Jones – R.I.P

Sharon Lafaye Jones – 4th May 1956 – 18th November 2016 Sharon Jones was considered by many to be the spiritual leader of the 2nd wave of funk music production that initially grew out of the late Acid Jazz/early ‘Deep Funk’ days, where more commonly heard sounds where being replaced by a desire to dig […]

ROD TEMPERTON – A GENIUS OF THE SONG

Cleethorpes may not be a hot bed of popular culture, but it is the birth place of one of its most successful songwriters in Rodney Lynn Temperton.  Better known as Rod, he was born in the town on 9th October 1949.   He went onto write or co-write some of the late 70s and early 80s […]

R.I.P Kashif

Soul singer Kashif Saleem (nee Michael Jones) passed away on Sunday 25th September.  He was just 56.  Kashif was one of the most influential and successful singers and producers of the eighties.  His innovative uses of synthesisers, computerised beats and basslines helped define the music of that era alongside the likes of Jimmy Jam and […]

Bobby Hutcherson – R.I.P

BOBBY HUTCHERSON –  GENIUS OF FREE AND BLUESY VIBES Bobby Hutcherson’s contribution to Jazz as a vibraphonist stands second to none and that includes the likes of Lionel Hampton, Milt Jackson and on the Fusion side Roy Ayers.  His work straddles, Hard Bop, Free Jazz, Latin and Jazz Funk.  He made his name, however recording […]