OBITUARIES

This folder includes obituaries for jazz musicians or persons of significance to the Australian jazz community, written by several contributors. Click on the INDEX box to access a list of obituaries contained in this folder.

OBITUARY: MARK SIMMONDS 1955-2020

by John Shand

Sydney Morning Herald, September 21, 2020

You'd look around the room and the see the other faces, blanched and wide-eyed, as though subjected to extreme G-forces. The sound of the saxophone, so overwhelming it seemed to hit you with the force of a shockwave, combined with the torrential emotions being conveyed to make a perfect musical storm. This was a typical concert by Mark Simmonds, perhaps the most potent musician Australia has produced on any instrument in any idiom or era, and one of the world's key tenor saxophonists of the past 45 years. Simmonds poured every atom of himself into each solo, and the effect across a concert was cumulative, leaving people both traumatised and exhilarated by music that was variously furious, wildly celebratory and devastatingly sad. It was also cumulative in its effect on Simmonds himself…

OBITUARY: ALLAN BROWNE, 1944-2015

by Timothy Stevens

timstevens.com.au, July 13, 2015

The first time I saw Allan Browne was at a gig that changed my life, and one about which I’ve written before: he played with Gary Costello and Paul Grabowsky in the Lounge at Mietta’s, in Alfred Place in the city, during the first half of 1990. I was in my first year at the Victorian College of the Arts, and I went with Sall (in the very early days of our relationship), and the whole experience was astonishing…

[Editor’s note: This is the obituary written by Tim Stevens and posted on his website shortly after his submission of an Allan Browne obituary to The Age newspaper, which was re-written by the obituary editor Lawrence Money and published over Stevens’s byline on June 22, 2015. Stevens has described this as “a miserable chain of events and very painful at an already difficult time.“ Ultimately Stevens’s name was taken off the online version. The original version of that obituary, as it was submitted to The Age, appears in full on this website at this link https://ericmyersjazz.com/obituaries-page-5.]

ON THE DEATH OF CHICK COREA

by Joe Chindamo

Facebook, February 12, 2021

I don't usually do personal obituaries on Facebook, but just a few minutes ago, I learned of the death of one of the most important people in my life, Chick Corea. I considered him a musical father. At 16 I heard that genius of an album Now he Sings, Now he sobs, which I still think is the most innovative, astounding and contemporary sounding improvisational trio recording ever made, and one which still sounds as fresh today as the day it was recorded (1968) - a monument to 20th century improvised music…