Deaths
- January 2 – Tex Ritter, country music singer, 68
- February 2 – Jean Absil, organist and composer, 80
- February 15 – Kurt Atterberg, composer, 86
- February 28 – Bobby Bloom, singer-songwriter, 28
- March 7 – Alberto Rabagliati, Italian singer and actor, 67
- March 28
- Dorothy Fields, lyricist, 68
- Dino Ciani, pianist, 32 (road accident)
- Arthur Crudup, singer, 68
- April 5 - Jennifer Vyvyan, operatic soprano, 49 (bronchial condition)
- April 7 – Pete Wendling, pianist and composer, 85
- April 15 – Giovanni D'Anzi, Italian songwriter, 68
- April 17 – Blossom Seeley, US singer and vaudeville entertainer, 87
- April 25 – Pamela Courson, Jim Morrison's widow, 27 (heroin overdose)
- May 8 – Graham Bond, R&B musician, 36 (hit by train)
- May 15 – Paul Gonsalves, jazz saxophonist, 53
- May 24 – Duke Ellington, jazz musician, and composer, 75
- June 8 – Rodolfo Lipizer, violinist and conductor, 79
- June 22 – Darius Milhaud, composer, 81
- June 27
- Cliff Friend, US composer
- Lightnin' Slim, blues musician, 61
- July 18 - Gabrielle Ritter-Ciampi, operatic soprano, 77
- July 29 – "Mama" Cass Elliott, singer (The Mamas & the Papas), 32 (heart attack)
- August 6 – Gene Ammons, tenor saxophonist, 49 (cancer)
- August 9 – Bill Chase, jazz rock trumpeter, 39
- August 11 – Maria Maksakova, Sr., opera singer, 72
- September 3 – Harry Partch, composer, 73
- September 22 - Marta Fuchs, operatic soprano, 76
- September 23 – Robbie McIntosh, drummer (Average White Band), 24
- October 5 - Ebe Stignani, operatic soprano, about 70
- October 13 - Josef Krips, vioinist, 72
- October 24 – David Oistrakh, violinist, 66
- November 5 - Marguerite Namara, operatic soprano, 85
- November 8 – Ivory Joe Hunter, R&B singer, songwriter and pianist
- November 11 – Alfonso Leng, composer, 80
- November 19 – George Brunies, jazz musician, 72
- November 21 – Frank Martin, composer, 84
- November 25 – Nick Drake, singer/songwriter, 26 (overdose)
Read more about this topic: 1974 In Music
Famous quotes containing the word deaths:
“Death is too much for men to bear, whereas women, who are practiced in bearing the deaths of men before their own and who are also practiced in bearing life, take death almost in stride. They go to meet death—that is, they attempt suicide—twice as often as men, though men are more “successful” because they use surer weapons, like guns.”
—Roger Rosenblatt (b. 1940)
“This is the 184th Demonstration.
...
What we do is not beautiful
hurts no one makes no one desperate
we do not break the panes of safety glass
stretching between people on the street
and the deaths they hire.”
—Marge Piercy (b. 1936)
“I sang of death but had I known
The many deaths one must have died
Before he came to meet his own!”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)