Rock 'n' roll legend Bo Diddley dies in Florida
By Jim Loney,
Reuters
Posted: 2008-06-02 15:31:16
MIAMI (Reuters) - Rock 'n' roll pioneer Bo Diddley, who banged out hit songs powered by the relentless "Bo Diddley beat," influencing rockers from Buddy Holly to U2, died Monday at the age of 79.
Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Florida, his management agency, Talent Consultants International, said in a statement.
"One of the founding fathers of rock 'n' roll has left the building he helped construct," the statement said.
Diddley suffered a stroke during a concert in Iowa in May 2007 and was hospitalized in Omaha, Nebraska. In August 2007 he had a heart attack in Florida.
Garry Mitchell, a grandson of Diddley and one of more than 35 family members at the musician's home when he died at about 1:45 a.m. EDT , said his death was not unexpected.
"There was a gospel song that was sang and he said, 'wow' with a thumbs up," Mitchell told Reuters, when asked to describe the scene at Diddley's deathbed.
"The song was 'Walk Around Heaven' and in his last words he stated that he was going to heaven."
In a career spanning more than five decades, Diddley composed a substantial body of rock classics, including "Who Do You Love," "Bo Diddley," "Bo Diddley's a Gunslinger," "Before You Accuse Me," "Mona," "I'm a Man" and "Pretty Thing."
He cranked them out on a signature rectangular guitar, setting many of them to the rumba-like rhythm of his "Bo Diddley beat" that gave rock 'n' roll a powerful rhythmic foundation.
Along with such contemporaries as Chuck Berry and Little Richard, he was among a pioneering group of black recordingartists who crossed the American racial divide with music that appealed to white audiences and was emulated by white performers.
Although Diddley recorded relatively few chart-topping hits, his seminal role in the formative years of rock music was recognized by his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 and with a Grammy lifetime achievement award in 1998.
Born Ellas Bates in 1928 in McComb, Mississippi, he took the last name McDaniel from his adoptive mother, and played classical violin as a boy.
'FIRST DUDE OUT THERE'
He was given the nickname Bo Diddley as a teenager after moving to Chicago, where he started playing music on street corners in the 1940s.
Inspired by blues musician John Lee Hooker's classic "Boogie Chillen," Diddley used his violin skills to craft a guitar sound that laid the basis for the funk music of the 1960s.
He found fame in the mid-1950s with his signature song "Bo Diddley." Even among the first wave of rock music, the song stood out with its tremolo guitar, maracas and trademark beat.
Diddley's unique guitar playing and rhythm influenced generations of rockers from Elvis Presley to Bon Jovi. Keith Richards and Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones and Richie Sambora of Bon Jovi made guest appearances on his records and Diddley played with the likes of The Clash and The Grateful Dead.
Arguably the greatest mainstream success of a song with the Bo Diddley beat was Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," recorded in the 1950s and which saw renewed success when it was covered by the Rolling Stones in the 1960s.
In an interview with The Sydney Morning Herald in March 2007, Diddley insisted he was the real father of rock, saying: "Little Richard came two or three years later, along with Elvis Presley. In other words, I was the first dude out there."
Diddley frequently complained about not being paid royalties during his peak years, telling The New York Times, "Have I been ripped off? ... You bet I've been ripped off."
In 1955 Diddley appeared on "The Ed Sullivan Show" and was promptly banned from further appearances because he defied Sullivan's instructions to sing a cover song and instead performed his own hit "Bo Diddley."
Diddley had harsh words for the direction black music had taken in recent years, telling Reuters that "gangsta" rap made his blood boil.
"I hate it. I call it rap-crap," Diddley said in a 1996 interview. "I can't seem to get my records played but they'll play all this garbage."
Diddley liked to help out in his local community in Florida. A father of five, he said he was deeply concerned about the direction of children in American society.
He worked with his local police department to warn teenagers about the dangers of drugs and gang violence.
Diddley was still touring and making records in recent years, not least because he said he needed the money.
His agency said public and private services are planned for this weekend.
Rock pioneer Bo Diddley, famous for square guitar, hat and unique rhythm, dies at age 79
Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Florida, his management agency, Talent Consultants International, said in a statement.
"One of the founding fathers of rock 'n' roll has left the building he helped construct," the statement said.
Diddley suffered a stroke during a concert in Iowa in May 2007 and was hospitalized in Omaha, Nebraska. In August 2007 he had a heart attack in Florida.
Garry Mitchell, a grandson of Diddley and one of more than 35 family members at the musician's home when he died at about 1:45 a.m. EDT , said his death was not unexpected.
"There was a gospel song that was sang and he said, 'wow' with a thumbs up," Mitchell told Reuters, when asked to describe the scene at Diddley's deathbed.
"The song was 'Walk Around Heaven' and in his last words he stated that he was going to heaven."
In a career spanning more than five decades, Diddley composed a substantial body of rock classics, including "Who Do You Love," "Bo Diddley," "Bo Diddley's a Gunslinger," "Before You Accuse Me," "Mona," "I'm a Man" and "Pretty Thing."
He cranked them out on a signature rectangular guitar, setting many of them to the rumba-like rhythm of his "Bo Diddley beat" that gave rock 'n' roll a powerful rhythmic foundation.
Along with such contemporaries as Chuck Berry and Little Richard, he was among a pioneering group of black recordingartists who crossed the American racial divide with music that appealed to white audiences and was emulated by white performers.
Although Diddley recorded relatively few chart-topping hits, his seminal role in the formative years of rock music was recognized by his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1987 and with a Grammy lifetime achievement award in 1998.
Born Ellas Bates in 1928 in McComb, Mississippi, he took the last name McDaniel from his adoptive mother, and played classical violin as a boy.
'FIRST DUDE OUT THERE'
He was given the nickname Bo Diddley as a teenager after moving to Chicago, where he started playing music on street corners in the 1940s.
Inspired by blues musician John Lee Hooker's classic "Boogie Chillen," Diddley used his violin skills to craft a guitar sound that laid the basis for the funk music of the 1960s.
He found fame in the mid-1950s with his signature song "Bo Diddley." Even among the first wave of rock music, the song stood out with its tremolo guitar, maracas and trademark beat.
Diddley's unique guitar playing and rhythm influenced generations of rockers from Elvis Presley to Bon Jovi. Keith Richards and Ron Wood of the Rolling Stones and Richie Sambora of Bon Jovi made guest appearances on his records and Diddley played with the likes of The Clash and The Grateful Dead.
Arguably the greatest mainstream success of a song with the Bo Diddley beat was Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," recorded in the 1950s and which saw renewed success when it was covered by the Rolling Stones in the 1960s.
In an interview with The Sydney Morning Herald in March 2007, Diddley insisted he was the real father of rock, saying: "Little Richard came two or three years later, along with Elvis Presley. In other words, I was the first dude out there."
Diddley frequently complained about not being paid royalties during his peak years, telling The New York Times, "Have I been ripped off? ... You bet I've been ripped off."
In 1955 Diddley appeared on "The Ed Sullivan Show" and was promptly banned from further appearances because he defied Sullivan's instructions to sing a cover song and instead performed his own hit "Bo Diddley."
Diddley had harsh words for the direction black music had taken in recent years, telling Reuters that "gangsta" rap made his blood boil.
"I hate it. I call it rap-crap," Diddley said in a 1996 interview. "I can't seem to get my records played but they'll play all this garbage."
Diddley liked to help out in his local community in Florida. A father of five, he said he was deeply concerned about the direction of children in American society.
He worked with his local police department to warn teenagers about the dangers of drugs and gang violence.
Diddley was still touring and making records in recent years, not least because he said he needed the money.
His agency said public and private services are planned for this weekend.
Rock pioneer Bo Diddley, famous for square guitar, hat and unique rhythm, dies at age 79
By RON WORD,
AP
Posted: 2008-06-02 12:27:57
JACKSONVILLE, Florida (AP) - Bo Diddley, a founding father of rock 'n' roll whose distinctive "shave and a haircut, two bits" rhythm and innovative guitar effects inspired legions of other musicians, died Monday after months of ill health. He was 79.
Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Florida, spokeswoman Susan Clary said. He had suffered a heart attack in August, three months after suffering a stroke while touring in Iowa. Doctors said the stroke affected his ability to speak, and he had returned to Florida to continue rehabilitation.
The legendary singer and performer, known for his homemade square guitar, dark glasses and black hat, was an inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, had a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, and received a lifetime achievement award in 1999 at the Grammy Awards. In recent years he also played for the elder President Bush and President Clinton.
Diddley appreciated the honors he received, "but it didn't put no figures in my checkbook."
"If you ain't got no money, ain't nobody calls you honey," he quipped.
The name Bo Diddley came from other youngsters when he was growing up in Chicago, he said in a 1999 interview.
"I don't know where the kids got it, but the kids in grammar school gave me that name," he said, adding that he liked it so it became his stage name. Other times, he gave somewhat differing stories on where he got the name. Some experts believe a possible source for the name is a one-string instrument used in traditional blues music called a diddley bow.
His first single, "Bo Diddley," introduced record buyers in 1955 to his signature rhythm: bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp, often summarized as "shave and a haircut, two bits." The B side, "I'm a Man," with its slightly humorous take on macho pride, also became a rock standard.
The company that issued his early songs was Chess-Checkers records, the storied Chicago-based labels that also recorded Chuck Berry and other stars.
Howard Kramer, assistant curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, said in 2006 that Diddley's Chess recordings "stand among the best singular recordings of the 20th century."
Diddley's other major songs included, "Say Man," "You Can't Judge a Book by Its Cover," "Shave and a Haircut," "Uncle John," "Who Do You Love?" and "The Mule."
Diddley's influence was felt on both sides of the Atlantic. Buddy Holly borrowed the bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp rhythm for his song "Not Fade Away."
The Rolling Stones' bluesy remake of that Holly song gave them their first chart single in the United States, in 1964. The following year, another British band, the Yardbirds, had a Top 20 hit in the U.S. with their version of "I'm a Man."
Diddley was also one of the pioneers of the electric guitar, adding reverb and tremelo effects. He even rigged some of his guitars himself.
"He treats it like it was a drum, very rhythmic," E. Michael Harrington, professor of music theory and composition at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., said in 2006.
Many other artists, including the Who, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello copied aspects of Diddley's style.
Growing up, Diddley said he had no musical idols, and he was not entirely pleased that others drew on his innovations.
"I don't like to copy anybody. Everybody tries to do what I do, update it," he said. "I don't have any idols I copied after."
"They copied everything I did, upgraded it, messed it up. It seems to me that nobody can come up with their own thing, they have to put a little bit of Bo Diddley there," he said.
Despite his success, Diddley claimed he only received a small portion of the money he made during his career. Partly as a result, he continued to tour and record music until his stroke. Between tours, he made his home near Gainesville in north Florida.
"Seventy ain't nothing but a damn number," he told The Associated Press in 1999. "I'm writing and creating new stuff and putting together new different things. Trying to stay out there and roll with the punches. I ain't quit yet."
Diddley, like other artists of his generations, was paid a flat fee for his recordings and said he received no royalty payments on record sales. He also said he was never paid for many of his performances.
"I am owed. I've never got paid," he said. "A dude with a pencil is worse than a cat with a machine gun."
In the early 1950s, Diddley said, disc jockeys called his type of music, "Jungle Music." It was Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed who is credited with inventing the term "rock 'n' roll."
Diddley said Freed was talking about him, when he introduced him, saying, "Here is a man with an original sound, who is going to rock and roll you right out of your seat."
Diddley won attention from a new generation in 1989 when he took part in the "Bo Knows" ad campaign for Nike, built around football and baseball star Bo Jackson. Commenting on Jackson's guitar skills, Diddley turned to the camera and said, "He don't know Diddley."
"I never could figure out what it had to do with shoes, but it worked," Diddley said. "I got into a lot of new front rooms on the tube."
Born as Ellas Bates on Dec. 30, 1928, in McComb, Mississippi, Diddley was later adopted by his mother's cousin and took on the name Ellis McDaniel, which his wife always called him.
When he was 5, his family moved to Chicago, where he learned the violin at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. He learned guitar at 10 and entertained passers-by on street corners.
By his early teens, Diddley was playing Chicago's Maxwell Street.
"I came out of school and made something out of myself. I am known all over the globe, all over the world. There are guys who have done a lot of things that don't have the same impact that I had," he said.
Diddley died of heart failure at his home in Archer, Florida, spokeswoman Susan Clary said. He had suffered a heart attack in August, three months after suffering a stroke while touring in Iowa. Doctors said the stroke affected his ability to speak, and he had returned to Florida to continue rehabilitation.
The legendary singer and performer, known for his homemade square guitar, dark glasses and black hat, was an inductee into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, had a star on Hollywood's Walk of Fame, and received a lifetime achievement award in 1999 at the Grammy Awards. In recent years he also played for the elder President Bush and President Clinton.
Diddley appreciated the honors he received, "but it didn't put no figures in my checkbook."
"If you ain't got no money, ain't nobody calls you honey," he quipped.
The name Bo Diddley came from other youngsters when he was growing up in Chicago, he said in a 1999 interview.
"I don't know where the kids got it, but the kids in grammar school gave me that name," he said, adding that he liked it so it became his stage name. Other times, he gave somewhat differing stories on where he got the name. Some experts believe a possible source for the name is a one-string instrument used in traditional blues music called a diddley bow.
His first single, "Bo Diddley," introduced record buyers in 1955 to his signature rhythm: bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp, often summarized as "shave and a haircut, two bits." The B side, "I'm a Man," with its slightly humorous take on macho pride, also became a rock standard.
The company that issued his early songs was Chess-Checkers records, the storied Chicago-based labels that also recorded Chuck Berry and other stars.
Howard Kramer, assistant curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, said in 2006 that Diddley's Chess recordings "stand among the best singular recordings of the 20th century."
Diddley's other major songs included, "Say Man," "You Can't Judge a Book by Its Cover," "Shave and a Haircut," "Uncle John," "Who Do You Love?" and "The Mule."
Diddley's influence was felt on both sides of the Atlantic. Buddy Holly borrowed the bomp ba-bomp bomp, bomp bomp rhythm for his song "Not Fade Away."
The Rolling Stones' bluesy remake of that Holly song gave them their first chart single in the United States, in 1964. The following year, another British band, the Yardbirds, had a Top 20 hit in the U.S. with their version of "I'm a Man."
Diddley was also one of the pioneers of the electric guitar, adding reverb and tremelo effects. He even rigged some of his guitars himself.
"He treats it like it was a drum, very rhythmic," E. Michael Harrington, professor of music theory and composition at Belmont University in Nashville, Tenn., said in 2006.
Many other artists, including the Who, Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello copied aspects of Diddley's style.
Growing up, Diddley said he had no musical idols, and he was not entirely pleased that others drew on his innovations.
"I don't like to copy anybody. Everybody tries to do what I do, update it," he said. "I don't have any idols I copied after."
"They copied everything I did, upgraded it, messed it up. It seems to me that nobody can come up with their own thing, they have to put a little bit of Bo Diddley there," he said.
Despite his success, Diddley claimed he only received a small portion of the money he made during his career. Partly as a result, he continued to tour and record music until his stroke. Between tours, he made his home near Gainesville in north Florida.
"Seventy ain't nothing but a damn number," he told The Associated Press in 1999. "I'm writing and creating new stuff and putting together new different things. Trying to stay out there and roll with the punches. I ain't quit yet."
Diddley, like other artists of his generations, was paid a flat fee for his recordings and said he received no royalty payments on record sales. He also said he was never paid for many of his performances.
"I am owed. I've never got paid," he said. "A dude with a pencil is worse than a cat with a machine gun."
In the early 1950s, Diddley said, disc jockeys called his type of music, "Jungle Music." It was Cleveland disc jockey Alan Freed who is credited with inventing the term "rock 'n' roll."
Diddley said Freed was talking about him, when he introduced him, saying, "Here is a man with an original sound, who is going to rock and roll you right out of your seat."
Diddley won attention from a new generation in 1989 when he took part in the "Bo Knows" ad campaign for Nike, built around football and baseball star Bo Jackson. Commenting on Jackson's guitar skills, Diddley turned to the camera and said, "He don't know Diddley."
"I never could figure out what it had to do with shoes, but it worked," Diddley said. "I got into a lot of new front rooms on the tube."
Born as Ellas Bates on Dec. 30, 1928, in McComb, Mississippi, Diddley was later adopted by his mother's cousin and took on the name Ellis McDaniel, which his wife always called him.
When he was 5, his family moved to Chicago, where he learned the violin at the Ebenezer Baptist Church. He learned guitar at 10 and entertained passers-by on street corners.
By his early teens, Diddley was playing Chicago's Maxwell Street.
"I came out of school and made something out of myself. I am known all over the globe, all over the world. There are guys who have done a lot of things that don't have the same impact that I had," he said.
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