Deaths (Obituaries)

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      Terry Carter, Barrier-Breaking Actor and Documentarian, Dies at 95

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      He was the only Black actor on “Combat!” and “The Phil Silvers Show,” then made well regarded documentaries on luminaries like Duke Ellington and Katherine Dunham.Terry Carter, who broke color barriers onstage and on television in the 1950s and ’60s and later produced multicultural documentaries on the jazz luminary Duke Ellington and the dancer-choreographer Katherine Dunham, died on Tuesday at his home in Midtown Manhattan. He was 95. His death was confirmed by his son, Miguel Carter DeCoste.Mr. Carter was raised in a bilingual home next door to a synagogue in a predominantly Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn. His best friend was the future jazz great Cecil Taylor. In his first stage role, at 9, Mr. Carter played the Portuguese explorer Vasco da Gama on a voyage of discovery.And in a wayfaring six-decade career, he was a merchant seaman, a jazz pianist, a law student, a television news anchor, a familiar character on network sitcoms, an Emmy-winning documentarian, a good will ambassador to China, a longtime expatriate in Europe — and a reported dead man; in 2015, rumors that he had been killed were mistaken. It was not him but a much younger Terry Carter who had died in a hit-and-run accident in Los Angeles by a pickup truck driven by the rap mogul Marion “Suge” Knight.Slightly misquoting Mark Twain, Mr. Carter posted on social media: “Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”While he acted in some 30 television series and movies, Mr. Carter was best known to viewers as Sgt. Joe Broadhurst, the sidekick to Deputy Marshal Sam McCloud (Dennis Weaver) on NBC’s “McCloud” series from 1970 to 1977, and in 21 episodes of “Battlestar Galactica,” as Colonel Tigh, second-in-command of the starship fleet in ABC’s original science-fiction series in 1978-79. (The series was revived for a second run from 2004 to 2009.)Mr. Carter, right, on “McCloud” as the sidekick to Deputy Marshal Sam McCloud, played by Dennis Weaver, left. Mr. Carter appeared on the series from 1970 to 1977.via Everett CollectionWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Bob Heil, Whose Innovations Enhanced the Sound of Rock, Dies at 83

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      A groundbreaking audio engineer, he provided the large-scale systems that brought tours by the Who and the Grateful Dead to life.Bob Heil’s career as a groundbreaking sound engineer who brought thunder and rich sonic coloring to tours by rock titans like the Grateful Dead and the Who began behind a pipe organ in a 1920s movie palace.Mr. Heil, who helped usher rock into its arena-shaking era by designing elaborate sound systems that allowed rock juggernauts of the late 1960s and ’70s to play at volcanic volumes, first learned to appreciate the full spectrum of musical tones as a teenager, when he took a job playing the massive Wurlitzer pipe organ at the opulent Fox Theater in St. Louis.“We had to voice and tune 3,500 pipes, from one inch to 32 feet,” he said in a 2022 video interview with the audio entrepreneur Ken Berger. “Voicing taught me to listen. Very few people know how to listen. Listening, you’ve got to mentally go in and dissect.”Mr. Heil died on Feb. 28 of cancer in a hospital in Belleville, Ill., his daughter Julie Staley said. He was 83. His death was not widely reported at the time.Although he worked behind the scenes, Mr. Heil was enough of a force that the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland credited him with “creating the template for modern rock sound systems” In 2006, the Hall installed a public display containing his mixing boards, speakers and other items.Mr. Heil developed some of the first effective sound systems for large rock concerts in the 1970s. The two men here were unidentified.via Heil SoundWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Lourdes Portillo, Oscar-Nominated Documentary Filmmaker, Dies at 80

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      Her films centered on Latin American experiences and received wide acclaim.Lourdes Portillo, an Oscar-nominated Mexican-born documentary filmmaker whose work explored Latin American social issues, died on Saturday at her home in San Francisco. She was 80.Her death was confirmed by her friend Soco Aguilar. No cause was given.One of Ms. Portillo’s best-known works is her 1994 documentary “The Devil Never Sleeps,” a murder-mystery in which she investigates the strange death of her multimillionaire uncle, whose widow claimed he had died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. In 2020, the Library of Congress selected the film for the National Film Registry.“Using vintage snapshots, old home movies and interviews, the film builds a biographical portrait of Oscar Ruiz Almeida, a Mexican rancher who amassed a fortune exporting vegetables to the United States and went on to become a powerful politician and businessman,” Stephen Holden, a Times movie critic, wrote in a 1995 review of the film.The documentary had the tenor of a telenovela and presented open questions about Mr. Ruiz Almeida’s mysterious life and death and the people who could have had a motive for the murder.“The more Oscar is discussed, the more enigmatic he seems,” Mr. Holden wrote.Ms. Portillo crafted the film’s story line from the information her mother relayed over the phone while Ms. Portillo was living in New York, she said in a talk at the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures in Los Angeles last year.The museum screened the movie last year as part of a series honoring Ms. Portillo and other filmmakers who have made significant contributions to cinema.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Mandisa Hundley, ‘American Idol’ Singer, Dies at 47

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      She performed and produced music with Christian themes and won a Grammy Award in 2013.Mandisa Hundley, a gospel singer whose strong vocals were applauded on “American Idol” and who later won a Grammy Award for best contemporary Christian music album, was found dead at her home in Nashville on Thursday. She was 47.The Media Collective, which represented Ms. Hundley, confirmed her death and said in a statement that the cause was not known.Ms. Hundley performed and produced music with Christian themes. She was a fan favorite on “American Idol” in 2006, but became the fourth of the 12 finalists to be eliminated.As a soul singer, she spoke openly about her love of God, and her music resonated with fans.Ms. Hundley famously stood up to Simon Cowell, the “American Idol” judge, who has a reputation for being intimidating. In her video interview for the show, she referred to her audition in Chicago, when Mr. Cowell, in an apparent joke about her weight, said after she left the room, “Do we have a bigger stage this year?”Ms. Hundley said in the video that, despite the remark, she would still travel to Hollywood and face Mr. Cowell in the final judging.“When I got to Hollywood, I knew I had to put my game face on,” she said. “I knew that I would finally get to speak my piece.”“You hurt me, and I cried,” she later told Mr. Cowell. “But I want you to know that I have forgiven you.” Mr. Cowell replied that he was “humbled,” and the two hugged.Ms. Hundley told The Oklahoman in 2006 that her faith helped her overcome Mr. Cowell’s hurtful remark.“Food has always been a problem for me,” she said. “When Simon first made the comments, it was a nightmare. But God turned it around. Those words became the impetus I needed to kick-start my plan to live a more healthful lifestyle and get my eating under control.”She went on to record several albums. Her first was “True Beauty,” in 2007. Her 2013 Grammy winning album, “Overcomer,” debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Christian Albums Chart. It was her first Grammy Award after three nominations.Mandisa Lynn Hundley was born in Sacramento on Oct. 2, 1976, to John Hundley and Ruby Berryman, who worked for the state. She sang at church and studied vocal performance at American River College, a community college in Sacramento, and then continued her studies at Fisk University in Nashville.After college, she worked as a vocalist for the singers Trisha Yearwood and Shania Twain.She is survived by her parents and a brother, John Hundley.On her 2017 album, “Out of the Dark,” she addressed her struggles with depression, which she also wrote about in a 2022 memoir of the same name.“My dream is that this book will be a tool used in living rooms and coffee shops all over the world to help prompt discussions about our mental health,” she told “Good Morning America.”Emmett Lindner More

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      Dickey Betts, Fiery Guitarist With Allman Brothers Band, Dies at 80

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      He traded licks with Duane Allman and proved to be a worthy sparring partner. He also wrote, and sang, the band’s biggest hit, “Ramblin’ Man.”Dickey Betts, a honky-tonk hell raiser who, as a guitarist for the Allman Brothers Band, traded fiery licks with Duane Allman in the band’s early-1970s heyday, and who went on to write some of the band’s most indelible songs, including its biggest hit, “Ramblin’ Man,” died on Thursday at his home in Osprey, Fla. He was 80.His death was announced on social media by his family. His manager David Spero said in a statement to Rolling Stone magazine that the cause was cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.Despite not being an actual Allman brother — the band, founded in 1969, was led by Duane Allman, who achieved guitar-god status before he died in a motorcycle accident at 24, and Gregg Allman, the lead vocalist, who got an added flash of the limelight in 1975 when he married Cher — Mr. Betts was a guiding force in the group for decades and central to the sound that, along with the music of Lynyrd Skynyrd, came to define Southern rock.Although pigeonholed by some fans in the band’s early days as its “other” guitarist, Mr. Betts, whose solos seemed at times to scorch the fretboard of his Gibson Les Paul, proved a worthy sparring partner to Duane Allman, serving more as a co-lead guitarist than as a sidekick.Mr. Betts in 1977. His solos at times seemed to scorch the fretboard of his Gibson Les Paul.Richard E. Aaron/Redferns, via Getty ImagesWith his chiseled features, Wild West mustache and gunfighter demeanor, Mr. Betts certainly looked the part of the star. And he played like one. Nowhere was that more apparent than on the band’s landmark 1971 live double album, “At Fillmore East,” which was filled with expansive jams and showcased the intricate interplay between Mr. Betts and Mr. Allman. It sold more than a million copies.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Marian Zazeela, an Artist of Light and Design, Dies at 83

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      She pivoted from painting to lighting exhibitions, performance art, graphic design and minimalist music, performed with her husband, the composer La Monte Young.In avant-garde New York, one of the most pilgrimaged sites has been the “Dream House,” a sensory environment that since 1993 has occupied the third story of a walk-up on Church Street in Lower Manhattan.From the ceiling of that small, carpeted room, theater lights treated with red and blue filters combine to throw auras of deep magenta on opposing walls. Four split discs of aluminum hang from the ceiling at torqued angles. As visitors enter and lie down, these mobiles spin slowly, catching light and casting morphing shadows of cursive E’s and wishbones.Instead of being absences of light, the shadows are positives: The lights are angled so that as one mobile shines red, its corresponding shadow speaks in blue, and vice versa.Behind this novel optical inversion was the artist and musician Marian Zazeela, who died in her sleep on March 28 after an illness, said her longtime student Jung Hee Choi, who did not specify a cause. Ms. Zazeela was 83.Ms. Zazeela never gained the renown of James Turrell or Dan Flavin, light artists who equaled her curiosity about altering optical perception in controlled environments. That oversight may have owed less to the ephemeral nature of her works than to the fact that hers were exclusively collaborative.Ms. Zazeela, right, with her husband, the musician and composer La Monte Young, and her longtime student Jung Hee Choi in New York City in 2009. The couple married in 1963.Will Ragozzino/Patrick McMullan, via Getty ImagesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Maurice El Medioni, Jewish Algerian Pianist, Dies at 95

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      He fused the music of his Sephardic roots with Arab traditions, incorporating boogie-woogie and other influences, to create a singular style.Maurice El Medioni, an Algerian-born pianist who fused Jewish and Arab musical traditions into a singular style he called “Pianoriental,” died on March 25 in Israel. He was 95.His death, at a nursing home in Herzliya, on Israel’s central coast, was confirmed by his manager, Yvonne Kahan.Mr. Medioni was a last representative of a once vibrant Jewish-Arab musical culture that flourished in North Africa before and after World War II and proudly drew from both heritages.In Oran, the Algerian port where he was born, he was sought after by Arabs and Jews alike to play at weddings and at banquets, in the years between the war and 1961, when the threat of violence and Algeria’s new independence from France drove Mr. Medioni and thousands of other Jews to flee.With his bounding octaves, his quasi-microtonal shifts in the style of traditional Arab music, his cheeky rumba rhythms learned from American G.I.s after the 1942 Allied invasion and his roots in the Jewish-Arab musical heritage called andalous, Mr. Medioni had honed a distinctive piano style by his early 20s. The singers he accompanied often alternated phrases in French and Arabic in a style known as “Françarabe.” His uncle Messaoud El Medioni was the famous musician known as Saoud L’Oranais, a leading practitioner of andalous who was deported by the Germans to the Sobibor death camp in 1943.The Medioni style remained buried and nearly forgotten for four decades as he pursued his trade as a men’s tailor. He kept it alive in private, performing at weddings and bar mitzvahs after he was forced to flee to France, until he released a breakthrough album, “Café Oran,” in 1996 at the age of 68. That led to a belated second life as a star of so-called world music — concert tours in Europe, appearances in documentary films and a major role as mentor to a new generation of Israeli musicians anxious to recover the musical heritage of their Sephardic heritage. In 2017, he published an autobiography, “A Memoir: From Oran to Marseilles (1938-1992),” which reproduces Mr. Medioni’s cursive scrawl, with a translation from the French.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Rico Wade, an Architect of Atlanta Hip-Hop, Dies at 52

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      As one-third of the production team Organized Noize, Wade nurtured the careers of Outkast, Goodie Mob and Future from the confines of his mother’s basement, known as the Dungeon.Rico Wade, an architect of Southern hip-hop who produced albums for rap acts including Outkast, Goodie Mob and Future, has died. He was 52.The death was announced on social media on Saturday by the artist and activist Killer Mike, a longtime collaborator. No cause of death was provided.His family confirmed the death in a statement. “We are deeply saddened by the sudden and unexpected passing of our son, father, husband and brother Rico Wade,” the statement said. “Our hearts are heavy as we mourn the loss of a talented individual who touched the lives of so many. We ask that you respect the legacy of our loved one and our privacy at this time.”Wade, Ray Murray and Patrick Brown, known as Sleepy, formed the Atlanta-based production crew Organized Noize in the early 1990s, coalescing during an era when offerings from the East and West Coasts dominated radio and major label releases. Their work propelled the region from the fringes of the genre to a mainstay at its center.Barely out of their teens, the production crew welcomed aspiring musicians and artists into the basement of Wade’s mother’s home in East Point, Georgia, in the early 1990s. The cellar became known as the Dungeon with the artists who performed there, including the groups Parental Advisory and Goodie Mob, who emerged from it as part of the collective colloquially called the Dungeon Family.“I don’t know if you can imagine how weed and must and dirt would smell together, but that’s what it smelled like,” Dee Dee Hibbler, Outkast’s former manager, said of the Dungeon in the 2016 documentary “The Art of Organized Noize.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More