Singer part of famed duo
Brothers’ harmonies shaped music’s future
LOS ANGELES — Phil Everly, who with his brother Don formed an influential harmony duo that touched the hearts and sparked the imaginations of many has died, He was 74.
Everly died on Friday of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease at a Burbank hospital, according to his son Jason Everly.
Phil and Don Everly helped draw the blueprint of rock ’n’ roll in the late 1950s and 1960s with a high harmony that captured the yearning and angst of a nation of teenage baby boomers looking for a way to express themselves beyond the simple platitudes of the pop music of the day.
The Beatles, early in their career, once referred to themselves as “the English Everly Brothers.”
And Bob Dylan once said, “We owe these guys everything. They started it all.”
The Everlys’ hit records included the then-titillating Wake Up Little Susie and the universally identifiable Bye Bye Love. Each featuring their twined voices with lyrics that mirrored the fatalism of country music and a rocking backbeat that more upbeat pop. In all, their career spanned five decades, although they performed separately from 1973 to 1983. In their heyday from 1957 to 1962, they had 19 top 40 hits.
The two broke up amid quarrelling in 1973 after 16 years of hits, then reunited in 1983, “sealing it with a hug,” Phil Everly said.
Although their number of hit records declined in the late 1980s, they made success- ful concert tours in this country and Europe. They were inducted into the Rock ’n’ Roll Hall of Fame in 1986.
Don Everly was born in 1937 in Brownie, Ky., to Ike and Margaret Everly, who were folk and country music singers. Phil Everly was born to the couple on Jan. 19, 1939, in Chicago where the Everlys moved to from Brownie when Ike grew tired of working in the coal mines.
The brothers began singing country music in 1945 on their family’s radio show in Shenandoah, Iowa.
Their career breakthrough came when they moved to Nashville in the mid-1950s and signed a recording contract with New York-based Cadence Records.
Their breakup came dramatically during a concert at Knott’s Berry Farm in California. During their breakup, they pursued solo singing careers with little fanfare. Phil also appeared in the Clint Eastwood movie Every Which Way but Loose.
Don Everly said in a 1986 Associated Press interview that the two were successful because “we never followed trends. We did what we liked and followed our instincts. ”