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April 03, 2020Bill Withers, American singer and musician, died on Monday from heart complications, but his family has only reported it now.Soul phenomenon of the 70s, with timeless pieces such as "Lean on me", "Aint 'no sunshine when she's gone" and "Just the Two of us", died surrounded by loved ones in Los Angeles.
Withers was a key figure in black music, and not only, in the 70s and 80s. After 8 albums and less than 15 years of career he retired and never sang again. He entered the Rock and Roll Hall or Fame in 2015, the same year at the Carnagie Hall a concert was held in his honor with several international caliber artists.
Recently his "Lean on me" had become a song-symbol of the sanitary workers who work every day risking their lives for the Covid-19 emergency.
Legend has it that when he went to the studio to record "Ain't no sunshine" in 1971, in addition to his friend Booker T., there were some great session men from Stax and other musicians. Withers had actually not yet written the entire lyrics of the song and had provisionally filled the verse with "I Know" repeated 26 times. It pleased everyone very much and Withers thought: "I am someone who makes mugs for the toilets of airplanes (it was really his job, editor's note), they are legends. What do I do, do I start to argue?". He didn't and history proved him right.