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Ben E King is dead and it really breaks my heart. This is such sad news.We only lost Percy Sledge less than a moth ago and now Ben E King!
Ben E king died at the age of 76..
His publicist confirmed that Ben E King died of natural causes sometime on Thursday (April 30).
Ben started out with the band The Drifters releasing hits like “There Goes My Baby” and
“Save The Last Dance For Me”
“Save The Last Dance For Me”
He later went solo and is best known for his hit song “Stand By Me.”
King started his career in the late 1950s with The Drifters, singing on hits including There
Goes My Baby and Save The Last Dance For Me. |
| A young Ben E king starting out. |
After going solo, he hit the US top five with Stand By Me in 1961.
It returned to the charts in the 1980s, including a three-week spell at number one in the UK, following its use in the film of the same name and a TV advert.
The song has charted nine times on the US Billboard 100 over the years - King's version twice and seven times with covers by artists like John Lennon and Spyder Turner.
In 1999, the BMI announced that the song, written by King with Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, was the fourth most-played track of the 20th Century on US radio and TV.
Earlier this year, the US Library of Congress added it to the National Recording Registry, declaring that "it was King's incandescent vocal that made it a classic".
Fellow musician Gary US Bonds wrote on Facebook that King was "one of the sweetest, gentlest and gifted souls that I have had the privilege of knowing and calling my friend for more than 50 years".
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| Ben E King looking funky in the 70s. |
He wrote: "I can tell you that Ben E will be missed more than words can say. Our sincere condolences go out to Betty and the entire family.
"Thank you Ben E for your friendship and the wonderful legacy you leave behind."
Pay dispute
Born Benjamin Earl Nelson, he initially joined a doo-wop group called The Five Crowns, who became The Drifters after that group's manager fired the band's previous members.
He co-wrote and sang on the band's single There Goes My Baby, which reached number two in the US in 1959.
But the group members were paid just $100 per week by their manager and, after a request for a pay rise was turned down, the singer decided to go it alone. In the process, he adopted the surname King.
His first solo hit, in 1961, was Spanish Harlem, which was followed by Stand By Me.
He originally intended Stand By Me for The Drifters, but said they turned it down. So he worked on it when Atlantic Records boss Ahmet Ertegun paired him with Leiber and Stoller.
"In my vocal I think you can hear something of my earlier times when I'd sing in subway halls for the echo, and perform doo-wop on street corners," he told The Guardian in 2013.
"But I had a lot of influences, too - singers like Sam Cooke, Brook Benton and Roy Hamilton. The song's success lay in the way Leiber and Stoller took chances, though, borrowing from symphonic scores, and we had a brilliant string arranger."
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| doing what he loved best on stage recently before his death. |
Stand By Me, Spanish Harlem and There Goes My Baby were all named on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's list of 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll, and were all given a Grammy Hall of Fame Award.
As the 1960s went on and rock 'n' roll took off, King's commercial success waned.
He continued to tour and, in the mid-1970s, Ertegun was so impressed by one of his shows in Miami that he decided to re-sign him to Atlantic.
That led to a return to the charts with Supernatural Thing - Part I, which reached the US top five in 1975.
He returned to the spotlight again in the late 1980s when Stand By Me was the theme song for Rob Reiner's film about boyhood friendship and was used in a British TV commercial for Levi's jeans.
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Ben E King with his group the Drifters. |
RIP Ben E King,thanx for the memories and standing by us all these years.
BBC News contributed to this report.