Guitarist Gary Rossington, the only living founding member of Lynyrd Skynyrd, has died at the age of 71 after years of battling various illnesses. Thus closes a chapter of the ill-fated American band, known for hits like Sweet Home Alabama or Free bird.
Although the musician’s death house has not been revealed, his heart problems were known, which caused him a heart attack in 2015 and forced him to undergo emergency surgery in 2021. “Gary is now with his colleagues Skynyrd playing in the sky,” the band explained in a statement posted on social media.
Born in Jacksonville, Florida, in 1951, Rossington entered the world of music at just 13 years old with Bob Burns, who owned a drum kit, after buying his first guitar by collecting empty Coca-Cola shells and delivering newspapers. That same 1964 he founded Lynyrd Skynyrd together with the vocalist Ronnie Van Zant, the also guitarist Allen Collins and the short Larry Junstrom, using as the name of the group that of a gym teacher of some of the members. However, almost a decade would pass before the group released their first album, (Pronounced ‘l?h-‘nérd ‘skin-‘nérd) (1973) which, in addition to classics such as Simple Man or Gimme three steps, included the iconic Free bird, in which Rossington left his signature in the form of guitar solos that have gone down in rock history.
Second Helping arrived the following year, and with it Sweet Home Alabama, the southern rock classic with which the quintet responded to Nel Young, who in some songs like Southern Man or Alabama accused the inhabitants of the southern United States of being racist. The song, composed by Van Zant and Rossington himself, was a sales success that, contrary to what one might think, did not pit them against the Canadian, who admired and would continue to admire the music of the Skynyrds.
The band’s success was cut short in 1977 when the plane that was taking them on tour crashed in a swamp, an accident that killed Ronnie VanZant, guitarist Steve Gaines, vocalist Cassie Gaines and manager Dean Kilpatrick. The rest of the band and crew were seriously injured. Gary Rossington ended up with broken legs, arms, wrists and a broken pelvis. After that accident the survivors of the band decided to dissolve when they were at the height of their success. “It was devastating,” he explained to Rolling Stone magazine in 2006. “You can’t talk about it casually and not have feelings about it.”
Three years later, and after Rossington performed several times with Allen Collins, the band was resurrected under the name The Rossington-Collins Band, which was later joined by Billy Powell and Leo Wikeson, also survivors of the accident. This formation lasted just three years to be recomposed in 1987 on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the accident. That line-up, with Johnny Van Zant (Ronnie’s son) as vocalist, is the one that has remained until today with numerous line-up changes.
Since 2009, with the death of pianist Billy Powell, Rossington became the sole survivor of the original lineup, which was inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame in 2016. It is estimated to have sold approximately 28 million. albums only in the United States.
