Joe Cocker

Joe Cocker initially struggled as a pop vocalist under the name Vance Arnold before carving out a distinctive style in rock and soul while performing in English pubs alongside the Grease Band. His cover of the Beatles' "A Little Help from My Friends" ascended to number one in the U.K. during November 1968. The performance of that same track at Woodstock in August 1969 launched his career to new heights. Another British success arrived in fall 1969 with his rendition of Leon Russell's "Delta Lady," by which time Russell had become Cocker's musical director, and both With a Little Help from My Friends (April 1969) and Joe Cocker! (November 1969) earned gold certification in America. His take on the Box Tops hit "The Letter" reached the U.S. Top Ten for the first time in 1970. Cocker achieved an early commercial peak when Russell assembled the Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour that same year, an expansive production featuring Cocker and more than forty other musicians that yielded a third gold album plus a concert film. Later projects drew smaller audiences, and alcohol issues both onstage and off diminished Cocker's formerly commanding voice to a raspy croak.

He reappeared in the U.S. Top Ten during 1975 with the romantic ballad "You Are So Beautiful," then claimed the top spot in 1982 through a duet with Jennifer Warnes on "Up Where We Belong," the theme from An Officer and a Gentleman. Occasional chart entries continued through the 1990s, though less often than in prior decades. Across from Midnight surfaced in 1997, followed two years later by No Ordinary World. Respect Yourself arrived in 2002, after which the covers collection Heart & Soul appeared in 2004. The European Parlophone release Hymn for My Soul, containing covers of songs by Stevie Wonder, George Harrison, Bob Dylan, and John Fogerty, emerged in 2007. His complete Live at Woodstock set received release in 2009. Hard Knocks, his first studio album in three years, surfaced across Europe in 2010. November 2012 saw the arrival of Fire It Up, Cocker's 23rd studio album, issued on Sony and produced by Matt Serletic, whose credits include work with Collective Soul, Rob Thomas, Matchbox Twenty, and many others. A little over two years afterward, on December 22, 2014, Cocker died of lung cancer.