Why 1963 And 1969 Were The Decade's Most Devastating Years For Music Fans

It's a sad, near inevitability that every year will bring with it the death of a famous and beloved musician, but 1963 and 1969 were particularly tragic as far as fans were concerned. Those years marked the sudden, inexplicable, and untimely deaths of icons across two popular music styles. Those shocking tragedies were made all the worse because those who died were so exceptionally talented and seemingly just getting started in their careers as artists and entertainers when their lives ended at an unfairly young age.

Before the long string of rock, pop, and country fatalities that would come to taint the history of 20th-century music, the deaths of big stars were a rare occurrence. It was somehow even worse for music fans in the 1960s when the exceptionally talented country music singer Patsy Cline died in 1963, and Rolling Stones guitarist and creative architect Brian Jones died in 1969. The horrific events surrounding their deaths made both years two of the worst of the entire decade for music fans.

In what would ultimately and sadly amount to a career spanning just six years in the public eye, Patsy Cline recorded numerous songs that weren't just hits on the pop and country charts but became enduring classics. Cline, with a sweet and strong voice that crisply conveyed a full range of emotions, breathed life into world-weary, late 1950s and early 1960s gems like "Walkin' After Midnight," "I Fall to Pieces," "She's Got You," and "Crazy," a song written by Willie Nelson before he became a country star himself.

On March 3, 1963, Patsy Cline and her band participated in a charity concert in Kansas City, Kansas, to benefit the family of Jack Call, a local DJ killed in a car accident. Two days later, Cline left town on a small, single-engine plane under the control of her manager, Randy Hughes, headed for Nashville. The aircraft suddenly and quickly descended, crashing into a forested area outside Camden, Tennessee.

All four people on board died immediately, including Hughes, country performers Hawkshaw Hawkins and Cowboy Copas, and Cline. She was 30 years old when she joined the list of musicians tragically killed in plane crashes. That accident began a month of country music fatalities. Soon after, Jack Anglin, one half of Johnnie & Jack, died in an automobile crash, and Texas Ruby died in a fire.

An original member of the Rolling Stones who helped create the band's sound alongside Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, Brian Jones played guitar, harmonica, and sitar for the hugely popular act throughout the 1960s. He incorporated more experimentation, evolving the group out of its R&B cover band roots.

Jones, moving away from the Rolling Stones and running afoul of the law on drug charges, announced his exit on June 8, 1969. "I want to play my kind of music, which is no longer the Stones music," he said in a statement (via Rolling Stone). This potentially devastating fracture in the band was framed as a mutual decision. "He wasn't enjoying himself and it got to the stage where we had to sit down and talk about it. So we did and decided the best thing was for him to leave," Jagger told Rolling Stone.

Even more troubling for rock fans in 1969: Jones died less than a month later, marking one of the saddest chapters in the tragic real-life story of the Rolling Stones. Just past midnight on July 3, 1969, Jones was discovered unresponsive in his home's swimming pool. Resuscitation attempts failed, and Jones had already died by the time a summoned doctor arrived on the scene. Jones was 27, and a coroner's inquest concluded that it was a case of death by misadventure, with Jones under the influence of alcohol and drugs at the time.