Stephen Ray Vaughan was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He was best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock band Double Trouble. He is considered to be one of the most iconic and influential musicians in the history of blues music. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. His music has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone.
About Stevie Ray Vaughan in brief
Stephen Ray Vaughan was an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He was best known as the guitarist and frontman of the blues rock band Double Trouble. He is considered to be one of the most iconic and influential musicians in the history of blues music. Vaughan was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2015, along with bandmates Chris Layton, Tommy Shannon, and Reese Wynans. In 2003, David Fricke of Rolling Stone ranked him the seventh greatest guitarist of all time. Vaughan and four others were killed in a helicopter crash in East Troy, Wisconsin, after performing with Double Trouble at Alpine Valley Music Theatre. His music has sold over 15 million albums in the United States alone. Vaughan’s father, Jimmie Lee Vaughan, was born on September 6, 1921, and died on August 27, 1986, exactly four years before Vaughan died. In 1961, for his seventh birthday, Vaughan received a guitar from Sears with a Western motif. In 1963, he acquired his first electric guitar, a Gibson ES-125. In the early 1960s, Vaughan’s admiration for his brother Jimmie resulted him trying different instruments such as the drums and the saxophone. He listened to blues artists such as Albert King, Muddy Waters, Otis Rush, and Lonnie Mack, as well as jazzists such as Kenny Burrell and Jimi Hendrix. In 1972, he dropped out of high school and moved to Austin, where he began to gain a following after playing gigs on the local club circuit.
Vaughan achieved mainstream success with his debut album Texas Flood in 1978. His fourth and final studio album In Step reached number 33 in the U.S. in 1989; it was one of Vaughan’s most critically and commercially successful releases and included his only number-one hit \”Crossfire\”. He became one of world’s most highly demanded blues performers, and he headlined Madison Square Garden in 1989 and the Beale Street Music Festival in 1990. In later years, Vaughan recalled that he had been a victim of violence of his father’s. His father struggled with alcohol abuse, and often terrorised his family and friends with his bad temper. He also struggled with the personal and professional pressures of fame, and his marriage to Lenora ‘Lenny’ Bailey. He successfully completed rehabilitation and began touring again with Double trouble in November 1986. He died in August 1990 at the age of 46. His family later filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Omniflight Helicopters, which was settled out of court. In 2012, Vaughan was awarded a posthumous Grammy for his contributions to the blues music genre. His last album, In Step, was released on November 14, 2013. He had a son, James “Big Jim” Vaughan, with whom he lived in Dallas, Texas, and a daughter, Lenny “Lenny” Vaughan. Vaughan died in November 2014 at age 53. He has a son with his wife Lenora Bailey, who he met while living in Austin.
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