Big Maybelle

popular name: Louis Prima

date_of_death: August 24, 1978

age: 67

cause_of_death: Cerebral hemorrhage followed by a 3 year waking coma

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Proud son of Italian immigrants and a talented band leader, trumpter, composer and singer Louis Prima developed his talent earning the title "King of the Vegas Lounges" and "The Wildest Act in Las Vegas." With poker-faced Keely Smith's cool image and melodic vocals coupled with Prima's inspired clowning and factured Italian dialect scat singer augmented by the backing band of Sam Butera and the Witnesses, Prima would wail wildly into the wee hours of the morning.

popular name: Waylon Jennings

date_of_death: February 13, 2002

age: 64

cause_of_death: Diabetic complications

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Waylon Jennings was the "outlaw" singer, songwriter and musician who was one of the founding pioneers of the Outlaw Movement in country music in the 1970s. A protégé of Buddy Holly and devotee of Hank Williams, he sold more than 40 million records, won 2 Grammy Awards, multiple Country Music Association awards including Male Vocalist of the Year, and was Ranked #7 in Rolling Stone's Top 100 Greatest Country Artists of All Time in a career spanning six decades. Upon his passing from diabetes complications, the legendary Waylon Jennings grave can be found at Mesa Cemetery in Mesa, Arizona.

popular name: Lester Young

date_of_death: March 15, 1959

age: 49

cause_of_death: Internal bleeding due to the effects of alcoholism

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Lester Young, nicknamed "Pres" or "Prez", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist who is considered by many to be the greatest, most influential tenor sax player in the jazz idiom. Lester rose to prominence with the Count Basie Orchestra. His playing in the Basie band was characterized by a relaxed style which contrasted sharply with the more forceful approach of Coleman Hawkins, the dominant tenor sax player of the day. After his dismissal from the Basie organization, Lester accompanied the singer Billie Holiday in a couple of studio sessions (during 1937 - 1941 period) and also made a small set of recordings with Nat "King" Cole (their first of several collaborations) in June 1942. From around 1951, Young's level of playing declined more precipitously as his drinking increased. His playing showed reliance on a small number of clichéd phrases and reduced creativity and originality. On December 8, 1957, Young appeared with Billie Holiday, Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster, Roy Eldridge, and Gerry Mulligan in the CBS television special The Sound of Jazz, performing Holiday's tune "Fine and Mellow." It was a reunion with Holiday, with whom he had lost contact over the years. She was also in physical decline, near the end of her career, yet they both gave moving performances. Young made his final studio recordings and live performances in Paris in March 1959 with drummer Kenny Clarke at the tail end of an abbreviated European tour during which he ate next to nothing and drank heavily. On a flight to New York City, he suffered from internal bleeding due to the effects of alcoholism and died in the early morning hours of March 15, 1959, only hours after arriving back in New York, at the age of 49.