Jeff Beck, one of the most skilled, admired and influential guitarists in rock history, died Tuesday January 10th in a hospital near his home at Riverhall, a rural estate in southern England. He was 78.

The cause was bacterial meningitis, Melissa Dragich, his publicist said.

During the 1960s and ’70s, as either a member of the Yardbirds or as leader of his own bands, Beck brought a sense of adventure to his playing that helped make the recordings by those groups groundbreaking, the New York Times reported.

In 1965, when he joined the Yardbirds to replace another guitar hero, Eric Clapton, the group was already one of the defining acts in Britain’s growing electric blues movement on songs like “Shapes of Things” and “Over Under Sideways Down”

Michael Flatley has been diagnosed with an aggressive form of cancer, according to his Instagram. “He has undergone surgery and is in the care of an excellent team of doctors. No further comments will be made at this time,” it stated. Flatley, 64, shot to fame with Riverdance, which first appeared during the 1994 Eurovision interval in Dublin

Story Date: January 17, 2023