Quincy Jones, one of the most important music producers in pop history, has died at the age of 91.
Quincy Jones was the unseen part of some of the most fabulous and well-known icebergs of modern music. That immense hidden part. The immense Quincy Jones: the archetype of the genius in the shadows who with sensational talent was able to propel brilliant and popular music (millionaire popular) to the stratosphere.
Quincy Jones was primarily the architect behind Thriller (1982) andOff The Wall (1979) by Michael Jackson, but also a composer of famous and award-winning soundtracks for film and television, collaborator with jazz and rhythm and blues icons like Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald,Ray Charles, and hundreds of other artists, and director of the most stellar pop orchestra in history, the 1985 charity song We Are the World.
Quincy Jones passed away on Sunday night at his home in Los Angeles in the Bel Air area, surrounded by his family, as confirmed by his representative, Arnold Robinson.
"Tonight, with hearts full but heavy, we must share the news of the passing of our father and brother Quincy Jones," the family said in a statement. "And while this represents an incredible loss for our family, we celebrate the great life he lived and know there will never be another like him."
The charismatic and lively Quincy Jones was born in Chicago on March 14, 1933, started his musical career as an arranger in the early 1950s, and did not stop working until a few years ago. An incredible seven-decade career whose achievements cannot fit into an obituary but deserve, more than most stars, an entire book.
Settling in New York in the early 1950s, from the very beginning he showed genius in the literal sense of the word, inventive and with a captivating personality. A composer, arranger, producer, and orchestra conductor, he was decisive in his early years in jazz, bringing a breath of fresh air to recordings of influential artists like Miles Davis, Count Basie, Cannonball Adderley, Lionel Hampton, Dizzy Gillespie, Art Farmer, Clifford Brown, and Tommy Dorsey, as well as glorious singers like Frank Sinatra and Dinah Washington. Before turning 30, he was already collaborating with both old legends and young innovators, a perfect example of his creative versatility.