Byrdie Green born 1923

 Byrdie Green (occasionally credited as Birdie Green) (1936 – April 26, 2008) was a jazz and R&B singer who never got the praise she deserved, even years after her death.  Green hopped around labels like Roulette and Twentieth Century Fox cutting singles, but it was her album work on the Prestige label that garnered all the attention thanks to her collaboration with organist Johnny "Hammond" Smith.

Byrdie Green was born Bertha Green in Detroit, Michigan. The daughter of a Baptist minister, she sang first in her father's church. Later she went to New York City and performed in clubs, and at one time was a protege of Ruth Brown. She was the first artist signed to Perri Records, who debuted with Green's single "Now is the Time For Love" b/w "Be Anything." She began recording with End Records and 20th Century Fox Records, cutting singles "How Come" b/w "Tremblin'" and "Get a Hold of Yourself" b/w "Don't Take Your Love From Me" in the early 1960s. The song "Get a Hold of Yourself" is a blend of blues and gospel, and Billboard calls it "a slew rockaballad" and "her strongest item."

                                   

Green performed at many popular venues, including The Apollo, Baby Grand, The Cookery and Pier 52, as well as Rutgers University, in Boston and in Bermuda. Around 1965, she was hired by organist Johnny "Hammond" Smith and signed with Prestige Records. Smith's The Stinger Meets the Golden Thrush was released in 1966, with Green singing on "They Call It Stormy Monday" and "If I Ruled The World." Green was acclaimed as "an excellent blues singer", "with a powerfully persuasive voice".

That same year Green released her first solo full-length The Golden Thrush Strikes at Midnight, featuring Smith on organ on "Goin' Out of My Head," "The Shadow of Your Smile" and "Hurt So Bad." Billboard said Green is "a soul singer with a lot to say and who says it well with a touch of the blues, jazz and gospel." Another reviewer said, "Miss Green displays here a skill that enables her to revitalize not only hard-core blues numbers, but also tried pop items .... She sings with much feeling no matter what the tune, and ... she emotes with a conviction few modern blues interpreters have shown."

She released two more albums, I Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good) in 1967, which featured Smith, Houston Person, Thornel Schwartz and Jimmy Lewis, and Sister Byrdie! in 1968, which one reviewer called a "gem of soul, blues, and gospel pinned down with Smith's patented organ grooves." Another described it as "slow and moody with some presentations and steppin' out and really telling you where it's at on the others ... always sounding so very groovy."The same year, she appeared on a Nipsey Russell TV show, and, at a performance in New York, was asked by Frank Sinatra to sing an extra set of songs. Her voice was likened to Dinah Washington.

Green took a break from her career to raise her two daughters, Deborah A. Murray and Dardenella Braxton. She recalls in a 1986 interview in The New York Times "it was necessary to stop, to give them guidance. I could always start my career up again." Green returned to perform at Carnegie Recital Hall in a show entitled Byrdie Green Sings the Blues on March 7, 1975, and continued to work on tour with The Thad Jones/Mel Lewis Orchestra. A 1977 live review by The New York Times John S. Wilson calls Green "a cool blues singer–crisp and curt, with a wry, ironic touch–and, in the blues, she projects a warmth and understanding." Another reviewer described her as having "strong, beautifully modulated voice" with "a command of dynamics which enables her to bathe a lyric in a running river of sound – soft, loud, gradations between."

In the 1980s she sang at Lickety Split, Adam Clayton Powell Blvd, Sutton's and at Jimmy Weston's, sometimes accompanied by Walter Bishop Jr. In 1989 she was referred to by The New Yorker as the "little known singer Byrdie Green" as she was joined on stage by Max Roach, Jimmy Heath and Carl Coleman. In 1985 and 1996 she performed in the USA and all over Europe with Linda Hopkins and Maxine Weldon in a show entitled "Black and Blue".

Byrdie"s health started to fade while she was still touring with the show. She later developed emphysema and was on oxygen 24 hours a day, and had to use a wheelchair. She died at Saint Luke’s Hospital on February 26, 2008, and was eulogized at Mountain. Neboh Church in New York City on Saturday, May 3, 2008. She was 72 years old. 

(Edited from Wikipedia & Prabook)

Otis Williams born 30 October 1941

Otis Williams (October 30, 1941) is an American tenor/baritone singer. He is occasionally also a songwriter and a record producer. Williams is the founder and last surviving original member of the Motown vocal group The Temptations, a group in which he continues to perform; he also owns the rights to the Temptations name.

Williams was born Otis Miles Jr. in Texarkana, Texas, to Otis Miles and Hazel Louise Williams. The couple separated shortly after their son's birth. While he was still a toddler, his mother married and moved to Detroit, Michigan, leaving the younger Otis Miles to be raised by both of his grandmothers in Texarkana. Hazel Williams moved her son to Detroit when he was ten years old, where he lived with his mother and his stepfather.

The Distants

Becoming interested in music as a teenager, Otis Miles Jr. adopted his mother's maiden name for his stage name, and as Otis Williams put together a number of singing groups. These groups included Otis Williams and the Siberians, the El Domingoes, and the Distants. In 1959, The Distants scored a local hit, co-written by Williams and their manager/producer Johnnie Mae Matthews, called "Come On", with lead vocals by Richard Street. Later Distants recordings were not as successful, and after an offer from Berry Gordy of Motown Records, Williams and his bandmates Elbridge "Al" Bryant and Richard Street quit the Distants. Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams from The Primes later joined Williams, Bryant, and Franklin to create the Elgins, who signed to Motown in March 1961 as "The Temptations", after being told another group was already using that name.

Temptations '64. Otis (bottom right)

The Temptations became one of the most successful acts in soul music over the course of nearly five decades, during which singers such as David Ruffin, Dennis Edwards, former Distant Richard Street, Damon Harris, Ron Tyson, Ali-Ollie Woodson, Theo Peoples, Ray Davis and former Spinners singer G. C. Cameron have all been members. As a member of the Temptations, Williams sings both Tenor and Baritone vocals. The Temptations biggest selling tracks include: My Girl, and (I Know) I'm Losing You, among many others. The groups have won four Grammy Awards, and have been nominated for nine.

                                   

Although he has served the longest tenure in the Temptations, Williams rarely sings lead, focusing instead on his role as the group's leader and organizer, and as the background "baritone in the middle". Some examples are, The Smokey Robinson and Eddie Kendricks written track "Don't Send Me Away" from the LP The Temptations with a Lot o' Soul (1967) and The intro on the early group song "Check Yourself" (1961)

Most notably, rare showcases for Williams singing lead are: "This Guy's in Love with You" from the 1968 albums Live at London's Talk of the Town and Diana Ross & The Supremes Join the Temptations and The Norman Whitfield-penned tune "I Ain't Got Nothing" from 1972's All Directions.

Williams has provided non-singing (spoken word) contributions to some Temptation songs, including: "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me" (1968, a hit duet with Diana Ross and Eddie Kendricks sharing the lead vocals), "I'm the Exception to the Rule", from the album Sky's the Limit (The Temptations album) (1971) which features leads from both Eddie Kendricks and Dennis Edwards, During the opening verse of "Masterpiece" (1973), and "For Your Love", which is done in a medley with "You Send Me" (led by Ali-Ollie Woodson) on the For Lovers Only album (1995).

The Temptations lineup changes were so frequent, stressful and troublesome that Williams and Melvin Franklin promised each other they would never quit the group.  Franklin would remain in the group until 1994, when he became physically incapable of continuing. Franklin died on February 23, 1995, leaving Otis Williams, then 53, as the last surviving original member of the quintet.

Williams married Josephine Rogers in 1961, the couple's son, Otis Lamont Miles, was born the same year. He and Josephine divorced in 1964.   He was also engaged to Patti LaBelle, but she ended the engagement when he asked her to quit music and become a housewife. Williams was married to Ann Cain from 1967 to 1973.  Cain was Ike Turner and Tina Turner's housekeeper. He married his third wife, Arleata "Goldie" Williams (née Carter), in 1983.

Williams is the co-author, with Patricia Romanowski, of Temptations, a 1988 book that served as both his autobiography and a history of the group. Ten years later, the book was adapted into an NBC television miniseries The Temptations.  In 1989, Otis Williams was inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of The Temptations. He received an honorary doctorate from Stillman College in May 2006. 

Williams still remains in the Temptations as of 2023, has performed on every release by the band, including their most recent studio album, Temptations 60, released on January 28, 2022, which also included a collaboration with Motown artist Smokey Robinson.  (Edited from Wikipedia)

 

Sea Cruise.

                                   

       Time for a break. So me and the good wife are off on a sea cruise. See y'all on the 30th. 

Don Parmley born 19 October 1933

Don Parmley (19 October 1933 – 30 June 2016) was a bluegrass musician and baritone singer known best for his work with the Bluegrass Cardinals, a group he formed in 1974. Prior to Bluegrass Cardinals, Parmley was a member of The Hillmen. 

Parmley was born in Monticello, Kentucky. As a 12-year-old he began learning claw-hammer/drop thumb banjo from his grandfather, but it was the driving three-finger banjo style of Earl Scruggs that he heard on the Grand Ol’ Opry that soon led to him taking up that method of picking the 5-string. Playing firstly just for family entertainment, Parmley quickly made a name for himself in the region, securing stints with popular touring groups of the era such as Carl Story and Hylo Brown. 

He enlisted in the U.S. Army during the Korean War. He was trained as a tank driver, but it wasn’t long before his musical talents became known among the ranks and his duties were expanded to provide music from “back home” to entertain his fellow troops. After his discharge, Don returned home and on May 26, 1956, he married Betty Jean Abbott. Faced with a severe shortage of employment opportunities in south central Kentucky, the Parmleys soon moved west to southern California where Don found a steady job and entry into a welcoming music community. 

He performed with the Golden State Boys regarded at the time as the top bluegrass band in the region.  As well Parmley, the band featured future Country music icon Vern Gosdin and his brother Rex, noted for his song-writing skills. 18-year-old mandolin prodigy Chris Hillman joined late in 1963. The band subsequently became known as The Blue Diamond Boys and then the Hillmen. The best known album from the quartet was the Together album. 

                       Here’s “Reuben’s Train” from above LP

                                  

Also, Parmley recorded with Glen Campbell, Doug Dillard and Billy Strange, the last named helped Parmley with an album mixing ‘Blue Grass and Folk Blues’, according to LP’s sleeve, as the duo played 5-string banjo and 12-string guitar. From 1964 Parmley was working as a musician for the television show The Beverly Hillbillies and is credited with all banjo work on the show throughout its nine seasons with the exception of the intro theme song. 

In 1974 Don Parmley formed the Bluegrass Cardinals with his 15-year-old son David (lead vocals and guitar) and tenor singer and mandolin player Randy Graham. The band’s calling card was their eponymous LP for Sierra Briar (SBR-4205, released in 1976) that prompted the Parmley family and the Bluegrass Cardinals to move east to settle in Virginia where they quickly established themselves as a top name on the bluegrass festival circuit, charming audiences with their solid, tasteful picking and beautiful vocal harmonies. 

According to the band’s manager/agent, the late Lance Leroy, a noted bluegrass and early country music historian, the Bluegrass Cardinals were the first bluegrass band to record bluegrass Gospel a cappella style. Many bands performed in that style long before but, for whatever reason, they didn’t record in that style. Their popularity led to a deal with Rounder Records that produced one LP Welcome to Virginia.  In all the Bluegrass Cardinals recorded prolifically during their 25-years existence; with five excellent LPs for Martin Haerle’s CMH label. During the mid-1980s in partnership with Sugar Hill Records the band released three LPs. Latterly, the Bluegrass Cardinals issued albums on their own label. 

Under Parmley’s leadership, the Bluegrass Cardinals provided a learning ground and springboard for the careers of Dale Perry, Mike Hartgrove, Larry Stephenson, Norman Wright, Bill Bryson, Barry Berrier, Warren Blair, Don Rigsby and Ernie Sykes. Parmley retired from full-time touring in 1997 with his son David moving on to form the band Continental Divide. Parmley occasionally sang in concerts with the Continental Divide. 

In April 2007 a ‘Day with Don Parmley’ was held in Wayne County, Kentucky. The event featured some great musical performances and a chance for local residents to spend time with Parmley. Signs stating “Welcome to Wayne County, Home of Don Parmley, Founding Member of the Bluegrass Cardinals” were erected on KY 90 at the Clinton and Pulaski county lines. 

Health problems troubled Don in his latter years He died in a Nashville hospital after experiencing complications related to Alzheimer’s disease on July 30, 2016, at age 83. 

(Edited from article by Richard Thompson @ Bluegrass Today & Wikipedia)

Jessie Mae Hemphill born 18 October 1923

Jessie Mae Hemphill (October 18, 1923 – July 22, 2006) was an American electric guitarist, songwriter, and vocalist specializing in the North Mississippi hill country blues traditions of her family and regional heritage.

Hemphill was born near Como and Senatobia, Mississippi, in the northern Mississippi hill country, just east of the Mississippi Delta. She began playing the guitar at the age of seven. She also played drums in local fife-and-drum bands, beginning with the band led by her paternal grandfather, Sid Hemphill, in which she played snare drum and bass drum. 

During most of the 1950s, the 1960s and the early 1970s, Hemphill's career was limited to the local and regional levels. She worked in several small places in the Delta as well as in Memphis where she lived for about twenty years. In Memphis, she played with a blues band in the 1950s and, when she was not playing, she worked for cleaners, cafeterias, or grocery stores; most of the time she worked at the cash registers. During these years she performed in bars and clubs in and around Memphis. At times, she performed in her own cafes or clubs in Memphis. 

Her first recordings were field recordings made by the blues researcher George Mitchell in 1967 and the ethnomusicologist David Evans in 1973, but they were not released. She was then known as Jessie Mae Brooks, using the surname from a brief early marriage. In the mid-1970s, she decided to return to the Delta. She left Memphis because of the increase in urban violence. She readily admitted that living in the countryside was better because of the lesser amount of violence. She also made it very clear that her life in her new rural environment was not her preferred lifestyle because of the absence of sociability on the part of many people, including some of her neighbours. 

In 1978, Evans went back to Memphis, Tennessee, to teach at Memphis State University (now the University of Memphis). The school founded the High Water Recording Company in 1979 to promote interest in the regional music of the South. Evans made the first high-quality field recordings of Hemphill in that year and soon after produced her first sessions for High Water. 

                       

Hemphill launched a recording career in the early 1980s. In 1981 her first full-length album, She-Wolf, was licensed from High Water and released by the French label Disques Vogue. In the early 1980s, she performed in a Mississippi drum corps assembled by Evans; it included Hemphill, Abe Young, and Jim Harper (who also played on Tav Falco's Panther Burns's album Behind the Magnolia Curtain). Hemphill performed in another drum group with Young and fife-and-drum band veteran Othar Turner for the television program Mr. Rogers' Neighbourhood. 

The French label Black & Blue Records released other recordings by her. Hemphill played concerts across the United States and in other countries, including France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, and Canada. In 1987 and 1988 she received the W. C. Handy Award for best traditional female blues artist. In 1987 she made her New York debut, accompanied by Evans and Walter Perkins. Her first American full-length album, Feelin' Good, released in 1990, won a Handy Award for best acoustic album.

Her instrument of choice on stage was the electric guitar that she played in what could be seen as a traditional adaptation of a modern instrument. She did not play extended solos or fast musical phrases. Instead, she used the guitar as a rhythm instrument by strumming or elaborating patterns to accompany her singing. She has also recorded tunes where she uses a tambourine attached to her foot or bells attached to her leg. In 1993 Hemphill had a stroke, which paralyzed her left side, preventing her from playing guitar; she retired from her blues career but continued to play by accompanying her band on the tambourine. 

In 2004, the Jessie Mae Hemphill Foundation released Dare You to Do It Again, a double album and DVD of gospel standards, newly recorded by the ailing vocalist, singing and playing tambourine with accompaniment from Steve Gardner, DJ Logic, and descendants of the late musicians Junior Kimbrough, R. L. Burnside, and Otha Turner. They were her first recordings since her stroke in 1993. Also in 2004, Inside Sounds released Get Right Blues, containing material recorded from 1979 through the early 1980s, and Black & Blue released Mississippi Blues Festival, which includes seven live tracks by her from a Paris concert in 1986. 

Hemphill died on July 22, 2006, at the Regional Medical Center in Memphis, after complications from a perforated ulcer. 

(Edited from Wikipedia & Delta Boogie) 

Sandra Reemer born 17 October 1950

Sandra Reemer (October 17, 1950 – June 6, 2017) was an Indo-Dutch singer and television presenter. She represented the Netherlands in the Eurovision Song Contest on three occasions, tying with Corry Brokken for most appearances representing the country. 

Barbara Alexandra Reemer, also known as Xandra, was born in Bandung, West Java, Indonesia. She was a child of Frans and Nel Reemer, of Dutch, Javanese and Chinese descent. Coming to the Netherlands following the Indonesian independence, little Xandra went to a school of nuns, who changed her name to Sandra, as they considered the “X” to be diabolical. 

Sandra started singing from age ten and performed with her brother Frank,singing and playing guitars. She had her first hit at eleven, when she covered the Italian 1961 Eurovision entry Al di là , by Betty Curtis. She also became popular with her extensive repertoire which included Indonesian Malay songs. When she recorded some of these folksy favorites, listeners took an immediate liking as they became very popular. 

In 1964 she sang Als jij maar wacht, the Dutch version of Non ho l’età by Gigliola Cinquetti, the 1964 Eurovision winner. In 1970 Sandra Reemer participated in the Dutch national selection for Eurovision for the first time, with the song Voorbij is de winter (“The winter is over”), although she did not win.  In the late 1960s she formed the duo Sandra & Andres with Andreas Dries Holten, and in 1972 they represented the Netherlands in the Eurovision Song Contest. After the duo broke up in 1975, she launched a solo career and entered the Eurovision Song Contest two times as a soloist representing the Netherlands. 

                                   

In 1976, this time credited under her real name, Reemer performed solo singing the song "The Party's Over", which reached ninth place. In 1979, she was credited as "Xandra" and sang the song "Colorado", which placed twelfth. The latter was co-written by Ferdi Bolland, who was also Sandra Reemer's husband for some time. 

Colorado became a huge hit in the Scandinavian countries and entered the top-5 in seven countries, including in Denmark, where Sandra Reemer/Xandra was admitted into the Music Hall Of Fame. She later returned to the contest to sing backing vocals for the Dutch entry in 1983, "Sing Me A Song", performed by Bernadette. 

Although she kept on releasing singles, Reemer was television presenter during the 1980’s and became known as 'the assistant' in the enormously popular programme Wedden Dat..? in which guests aimed at successfully completing a bet on live television. Reemer took on the role as assistant of the show's host. In 1987 the album Best Of My Love, with covers, was released. Various singles followed, entering the Dutch Top 40 singles chart. In 1996 the Dutch-language album Natuurlijk was released. 

Marga, Sandra & Sjouke

From 2000 until 2005, Reemer worked together with other former Eurovision participants Marga Bult (1987) and Sjoukje Smit (1980, as Maggie MacNeal) as The Dutch Divas. In 2001, the ladies scored a minor hit "From New York to L.A" (a cover version of a Patsy Gallant disco classic) on the Dutch Top 100. She also went on performing during major events as a solo artist, including at the Amsterdam Diner, the Gay Pride, and more. She continued to be a popular guest at Eurovision fan events across Europe. 

In 2006 the Queen of the Netherlands appointed Sandra as a Knight in the Order of Orange Nassau for all her activities as a singer, presenter and her contribution to a better living environment through her social involvement in the field of nature and the environment and the 3rd world. 

In 2008 she started the Sandra Reemer Foundation (SRF), aimed at helping disadvantaged children in developing countries. The foundation unfortunately had to stop in 2013, but it has helped more than 500 children in Indonesia, Africa and Guatemala. Sandra had no children of her own. 

In 2010, the singer organized an exhibition in the Lloyd Hotel Amsterdam, about the history of the Dutch Eurovision dresses. In 2014 she co-hosted Eurovision in Concert. 

Early in 2017, Sandra Reemer participated in the reality soap Gouden Jaren: Indonesië (“Golden Years: Indonesia”), based on the British series The Real Marigold Hotel, together with colleague Ben Cramer (Eurovision 1973). In an interview with the Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf in March 2017, Reemer spoke openly about her cancer diagnosis: "You think or hope it's nothing, that it will go away. My family doctor urged me to go to hospital, but I always had some sort of excuse why not to go. Eventually I was diagnosed with breast cancer." 

Treatment was unfortunately not successful and she died on June 6, 2017, at the Antoni van Leeuwenhoek hospital in Amsterdam, Netherlands. She was 66 years old.

(Edited from Wikipedia , Eurovision.tv.,Eurovision Song Contest Today & Discogs)

Nico born 16 October 1938

Christa Päffgen (16 October 1938 – 18 July 1988), known by her stage name Nico, was a German singer, songwriter, actress and model. 

Nico was born Christa Päffgen in Cologne to Wilhelm and Margarete "Grete" Päffgen. When Nico was two years old, she moved with her mother and grandfather to the Spreewald forest outside Berlin to escape the World War II bombardments of Cologne.  In 1946, Nico and her mother relocated to downtown Berlin, where Grete worked as a seamstress. She attended school until the age of 13, and began selling lingerie in the exclusive department store KaDeWe, eventually getting modelling jobs in Berlin. At 5 ft 10 in (178 cm), and with chiseled features and pale skin, Nico rose to prominence as a fashion model when still a teenager. 

Nico was discovered at 16 by photographer Herbert Tobias while both were working at a KaDeWe fashion show in Berlin. He gave her the name "Nico" after a man he had fallen in love with, filmmaker Nikos Papatakis, and she used it for the rest of her life. She moved to Paris and began working for Vogue, Tempo, Vie Nuove, Mascotte Spettacolo, Camera, Elle, and other fashion magazines. Around this time, she dyed her brown hair blonde, later claiming she was inspired to do so by Ernest Hemingway. At age 17, she was contracted by Coco Chanel to promote their products, but she fled to New York City and abandoned the job. Through her travels, she learned to speak English, Spanish, and French. 

Nico studied acting at Lee Strasberg's New York Actor Studio and in 1959, she was invited to the set of Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita, where she attracted the attention of the acclaimed director, who gave her a minor role in the film as herself. After a role in the 1961 Jean Paul Belmondo film A Man Named Rocca, she appeared as the cover model on jazz pianist Bill Evans' 1962 album, Moon Beams. After splitting her time between New York and Paris, she got the lead role in Jacques Poitrenaud's Strip-Tease (1963). 

In New York, Nico first met Greek filmmaker Nico Papatakis, whose name she had adopted as her stage name several years earlier. The two lived together between 1959 and 1961. After noticing her singing around the apartment, Papatakis asked her if she had ever considered a career in music and ended up enrolling her in her first singing lessons. 

                                   

She then became part of the Swinging London scene, and had a short relationship with The Rolling Stones' Brian Jones and she recorded her first record in London in 1965, the single I'm Not Saying/The Last Mile, produced by Jimmy Page, for Rolling Stones manager Andrew Loog Oldham's label Immediate Records. 

Thanks to Jones she met Andy Warhol in New York City and became part of Warhol's Factory, and Warhol introduced her to the Rock band The Velvet Underground, with whom she recorded the album "The Velvet Underground & Nico", featuring the legendary banana cover designed by Andy Warhol. The album has been named by numerous publications as one of the top 100 albums of all time, and is often considered one of history's 10 most influential albums by critics. 

In 1967 she met and began a relationship with The Doors’ frontman Jim Morrison. Although their time together was tempestuous, it emboldened Nico to see herself as a creative artist in her own right. At Morrison’s encouragement she bought a harmonium so that she could write music and, importantly, accompany herself when she performed, so she was no longer shackled to backing guitarists. 

Nico later recorded several solo albums, including the folksy Chelsea Girl in 1967, followed by original albums such as The Marble Index and Desertshore, which were much darker and avant garde in style. She released several more albums throughout the 1970s. In 1981, Nico played a show in Manchester and afterwards confessed to promoter Alan Wise that she had nowhere to go. He gave her a place to stay, beginning a seven-year period in which she lived predominantly in the city. While she was by now living with a serious heroin addiction, Wise’s stewardship helped her return to touring and recording.  In 1985 Nico recorded “Camera Obscura,” her first album in 11 years and released in the United States on the PVC label. Despite what critics found a pleasant mix of new material and such evergreen songs as “My Funny Valentine,” it failed to attract much popular attention. 

In her final years she performed her tragic repertoire less frequently and gradually came to spend most of her time in Ibiza where she died on 17 July 1988 from a cerebral hemorrhage after falling from her bike. She was only 49 years old.  She is buried in Berlin, next to her mother.

(Edited from Wikipedia, Independent & IMDb)