Finding out the ages of these great musicians as they pass is making me feel old! This is the music I listened to from my teens onward.
Yes, too sad. I now have no tolerance for the knocks against us older FReepers. My dear wife died last year and I’m havin a hard time.
Jeff Beck was a class act. I didn’t happen to see him live unlike most of the greats but have 90% of his cds and dvds.
His main limitation was he couldn’t sing well, so had to rely on others in his groups who would soon leave him for their own careers(Rod Stewart on Beck’s first album for example.) As he said to Eric Clapton on a DVD the lack of pop singles like those that Clapton had all along was a drawback. There have been instrumental hits from the 50s onward but building a career on them isn’t easy.
His lyrical, improvisational playing was more related to Wes Montgomery and even Django Reinhardt than to the hard rockers even though he could keep pace with the very best of them and surpass them.
His Grammy Award for A Day in the Life by the Beatles and the acclaim for Emotion and Commotion and the 2007 Eric Clapton Crossroads festival—both with the prodigy bassist Tal Wilkenfeld were well deserved. The Crossroads performance included a standing ovation combination of Beck’s guitar and her bass improvisation that were stunning.
He will be missed.
May he rest in peace.
I know....it is seriously depressing...