Queen Candice Anderson

popular name: Elvin Shepherd

date_of_death: June 2, 1995

age: 72

cause_of_death: Undisclosed

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Elvin "Shep" Shepherd was a legendary saxophonist whose career spanned half a century. He traveled with such big name bands as Buck Clayton, Bill Doggett, Billy Ekstine, Erskin Hawkins, Lucky Milinder, and Nat Towles. During his storied career he also accompanied such artists as Aretha Franklin, Gladys Knight, Ray Price, Della Reese, and Dakota Staton.

popular name: Antonio Salieri

date_of_death: May 7, 1825

age: 74

cause_of_death: Effects of dementia caused by a head wound

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Antonio Salieri was an Italian classical composer, conductor, and teacher. Salieri was a pivotal figure in the development of late 18th-century opera. As a student of Florian Leopold Gassmann, and a protégé of Christoph Willibald Gluck, Salieri was a cosmopolitan composer who wrote operas in three languages. Salieri helped to develop and shape many of the features of operatic compositional vocabulary, and his music was a powerful influence on contemporary composers. Appointed the director of the Italian opera by the Habsburg court, a post he held from 1774 until 1792, Salieri dominated Italian-language opera in Vienna. During his career, he also spent time writing works for opera houses in Paris, Rome, and Venice, and his dramatic works were widely performed throughout Europe during his lifetime. Even as his works dropped from performance, and he wrote no new operas after 1804, he still remained one of the most important and sought-after teachers of his generation, and his influence was felt in every aspect of Vienna's musical life. Franz Liszt, Franz Schubert, Ludwig van Beethoven, Anton Eberl, Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Franz Xaver Wolfgang Mozart were among the most famous of his pupils. In the last year of his life he struggled with health issues related to a head injury and passed away at the age of 74.

popular name: Patsy Cline

date_of_death: March 5, 1963

age: 30

cause_of_death: Plane crash

claim_to_fame: Music

best_know_for: Patsy Cline was an American singer and performer and is considered by many to be one of the most influential vocalists of the 20th century and was one of the first country music artists to successfully cross over into pop music. Patsy had several major hits during her short eight-year recording career, including two number-one hits on the Billboard Hot Country and Western Sides chart. Struggling to make ends meet for the first half of her career, she scored a #2 hit on the charts with Willie Nelson's "Crazy" in 1961. In November 1961, she was invited to perform as part of the Grand Ole Opry's show at Carnegie Hall in New York City followed by an in-residence at the Mint in Las Vegas (a first for a female country music singer), as did appearances at the Hollywood Bowl and Carnegie Hall (a performance for which Cline did not get paid). But with the exposure and radio play of "Leavin' on Your Mind" and "Crazy," Cline was on her way to stardom. In a letter to a friend, she wrote: "It's wonderful — but what do I do for '63? It's getting so even Cline can't follow Cline." Among her many awards during her brief career, Patsy would be the first solo female artist inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in October 1973.