Bassist

Larry Knechtel, a member of the 1970s soft-rock group Bread, who had a wide-ranging career as a studio musician, has died. Knechtel died Thursday at Yakima Valley Memorial Hospital in Yakima, Wash. He was 69. A hospital official would not release a cause of death, but a report in the Yakima Herald-Republic said he apparently suffered a heart attack. Knechtel played keyboards, bass guitar and harmonica as a member of the Wrecking Crew, a group of Los Angeles studio musicians that included future headliners Glen Campbell and Leon Russell and session drummer Hal Blaine.

Chi Cheng Deftones bassist injured in car crash Chi Cheng, 42, the bassist for the Grammy-winning rock band the Deftones, died Saturday at a Sacramento hospital from injuries he suffered in an automobile crash more than four years ago. His mother, Jeanne Marie Cheng, announced his death on the website One Love for Chi that had been set up to support him. In 2001, Cheng and his bandmates received a Grammy Award for best metal...

Dickie Peterson, the bassist and lead singer for Blue Cheer, the San Francisco power trio best known for its high-volume 1968 hit rendition of the rock 'n' roll classic "Summertime Blues," has died. He was 63. Peterson, who had prostate cancer that spread to other parts of his body, died Monday in Erkelenz, Germany, where he lived, said Ron Rainey, the band's manager. Taking its name from a potent strain of LSD -- as well as giving a nod to their love of the blues -- Blue Cheer began as a six-piece band in 1966 and downsized a year later to a trio consisting of Peterson on bass and vocals, Leigh Stephens on guitar and Paul Whaley on drums.

Richard D. Kelley, a bassist whose tenure with the Los Angeles Philharmonic lasted nearly six decades, died on Tuesday at 76. The musician died at his home in La Puente following a long battle with cancer, according to an orchestra spokeswoman. Kelley was one of the orchestra's longest serving musicians at the time of his retirement in October. He joined the bass section in 1956 at the age of 19. During his 57-year tenure, he played under six different music directors, most recently with Gustavo Dudamel.

Lee Dorman, 70, the bassist for the psychedelic rock band Iron Butterfly, was found dead Friday morning in a vehicle, said Gail Krause, an Orange County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman. A coroner's investigation is under way, but foul play is not suspected. Iron Butterfly was formed in San Diego in 1966 and recorded an album before Dorman joined a revised lineup that included guitarist Erik Braunn, keyboardist and singer Doug Ingle and drummer Ron Bushy. In 1968, the group recorded "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida," a 17-minute heavy metal track that "was nothing short of a pop monument," The Times said in 1988, "the song of the moment" that caught the attention of the counterculture market.

Equally adept with classical and jazz, New York-based pianist Uri Caine performs with a trio that includes bassist Drew Gress and drummer Clarence Penn for a night that should be reminiscent of his celebrated Village Vanguard live recordings and his 2011 album "Siren" (which surprisingly marked his first studio recording in a trio). The Blue Whale, 123 Astronaut E.S. Onizuka St., Suite 301., L.A. Sat., 9 p.m. $15 http://www.bluewhalemusic.com .

Michael Davis Bassist for rock band MC5 Michael Davis, 68, the bassist of influential late 1960s rock band MC5, died Friday of liver failure at Enloe Medical Center in Chico, Calif., said his wife, Angela Davis. The Motor City Five, later known as MC5, rose to prominence in 1964, making waves with incendiary anti-establishment lyrics and a blistering early punk sound, starting with their first album "Kick Out the Jams," released in 1969. Known for its live performances, the band played outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago before rioting ended the concert.

Re "Front man or side man?" Opinion, Jan. 13 Joe Queenan did the world a favor by giving up music. The fact that he didn't get the girl as a bassist, and his bandmates couldn't tell that he couldn't play, screams volumes about the level of musicianship of his bandmates. Bassists who are frustrated guitarists are, in reality, not bassists at all. The two instruments have different roles to play, and the skilled bassist understands that instinctively. Obviously, Queenan didn't get it. As a bassist who played professionally for 18 years, I never lacked for female companionship, and my bandmates could always tell if I was playing well or having an off night.

Ashlee Simpson-Wentz and Pete Wentz are the proud parents of a baby boy, and they're celebrating with some Bronx cheer -- a good one. Their representative says the pop and rock star couple have named their son Bronx Mowgli. The baby, born Thursday night, weighed 7 pounds, 11 ounces. Bronx is the first child for Simpson-Wentz and Wentz, bassist for the rock band Fall Out Boy. They were married earlier this year.

Free-swinging jazz is consistent with Marsalis' New Orleans-based family dynasty. The saxophonist will no doubt keep things at a steady boil here, aided in no small part by a band that includes bassist Eric Revis, pianist Joey Calderazzo and a young force of nature behind the drums, Justin Faulkner. Valley Performing Arts Center, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge. 8 p.m. Sat. $45-$75. http://www.valleyperformingartscenter.org .

Deftones bassist Chi Cheng, who been in a partially conscious state since a 2008 car accident, died this weekend, his record label has confirmed. He was 42. Word of Cheng's passing was made public via fan/charitable site One Love for Chi , started by fan Gina Blackmore to help raise funds for Cheng's medical expenses. Cheng's family had come to use the site to communicate updates on the musician, and his mother posted Sunday that Cheng's "heart just suddenly stopped. " "I know that you will always remember him as a giant of a man on stage with a heart for every one of you," wrote Jeanne Marie Cheng.

At a placid outdoor table in the Silver Lake restaurant Local, the frontmen of Local Natives are drinking coffee and look entirely at home. The restaurant is just a few blocks from their rehearsal space, a small house teetering above Sunset Boulevard and the indie-rock nightclubs where the quartet made its L.A. reputation. Singers Kelcey Ayer and Taylor Rice greet the server with the handshakes of old regulars, and along the way they hug members of another local act, Body Parts, that they had tried to land as openers for upcoming shows promoting their second album, "Hummingbird.

Astrid Kirchherr met the Beatles in 1960 when they were five lads from Liverpool pounding out marathon shows at a club in a seedy part of her native Hamburg, Germany. She fell for the bass player, Stuart Sutcliffe, and found the others - John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Pete Best (the group's drummer before Ringo Starr) - fascinating. "I was just amazed how beautiful these boys looked," she told National Public Radio's Terry Gross in 2008. Kirchherr, a photographer's assistant, began taking pictures of her new friends.

Free-swinging jazz is consistent with Marsalis' New Orleans-based family dynasty. The saxophonist will no doubt keep things at a steady boil here, aided in no small part by a band that includes bassist Eric Revis, pianist Joey Calderazzo and a young force of nature behind the drums, Justin Faulkner. Valley Performing Arts Center, 18111 Nordhoff St., Northridge. 8 p.m. Sat. $45-$75. http://www.valleyperformingartscenter.org .

Unknown Pleasures Inside Joy Division Peter Hook It Books: 416 pp., $27.99 In the three decades since he committed suicide, singer Ian Curtis has become both a symbol and a caricature. Curtis' seemingly tortured life as a member of the English post-punk band Joy Division and early death in 1980 have been transformed into myth and Curtis into a modern-day Thomas Chatterton or Sylvia Plath. His life offers a perfect narrative for disaffected, sun-averse souls the world over: a young genius too pure to live.

Equally adept with classical and jazz, New York-based pianist Uri Caine performs with a trio that includes bassist Drew Gress and drummer Clarence Penn for a night that should be reminiscent of his celebrated Village Vanguard live recordings and his 2011 album "Siren" (which surprisingly marked his first studio recording in a trio). The Blue Whale, 123 Astronaut E.S. Onizuka St., Suite 301., L.A. Sat., 9 p.m. $15 http://www.bluewhalemusic.com .

My well-worn fedora is off to RJ Smith for his passionate, eloquent profile of Charlie Haden ("All That L.A. Jazz," Jan. 19). I've read some good articles on the bassist, but Smith really fleshed out this talented, skilled, dedicated, spiritual musician. Haden's Quartet West is a blend of romanticism, optimism, nostalgia, melancholy and pure swinging. And what a treat it was to sit in on the CalArts class and the guided tour of L.A.'s jazz past. David Challinor Santa Barbara In the early '60s, I picked up a Denny Zeitlin piano trio album and was distracted by the monster bass player.

When tenor saxophonist Pharoah Sanders walked on stage for his first set at Catalina Bar & Grill, he was greeted by a front row of listeners containing no fewer than five young men wearing ponytails and tie-dyes. The symbolism was inescapable. Sixties revivalism has finally embraced the decade's most clangorously radical new music. How ironic, then, that Sanders' performance Tuesday night retained few of the radically innovative qualities that marked him in the mid-'60s as one of John Coltrane's most gifted legatees.

Lee Dorman, 70, the bassist for the psychedelic rock band Iron Butterfly, was found dead Friday morning in a vehicle, said Gail Krause, an Orange County Sheriff's Department spokeswoman. A coroner's investigation is under way, but foul play is not suspected. Iron Butterfly was formed in San Diego in 1966 and recorded an album before Dorman joined a revised lineup that included guitarist Erik Braunn, keyboardist and singer Doug Ingle and drummer Ron Bushy. In 1968, the group recorded "In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida," a 17-minute heavy metal track that "was nothing short of a pop monument," The Times said in 1988, "the song of the moment" that caught the attention of the counterculture market.

U2 may have asked how to dismantle an atomic bomb on a recent album, but from 2004 to 2008 Carol Hawkins dismantled U2 bassist Adam Clayton's finances. Hawkins, a domestic aide Clayton hired to attend to his south Dublin mansion, was sentenced Friday for embezzling $3.6 million from Clayton's bank accounts to fund pricey purchases such as first-class flights, a car, university educations for her children and nearly two dozen thoroughbred horses. Hawkins had been found guilty last week on 181 counts of writing checks from Clayton's bank account for personal purchases, and Friday an Irish jury unanimously sentenced her to a seven-year sentence.