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Sonny Curtis, the singer-songwriter famous as the frontman of the Crickets — and as the writer of the iconic “Mary Tyler Moore” TV theme song “Love Is All Around” — died Friday after what his daughter confirmed to THR was a “short illness.”
He was 88.
Curtis, born May 9, 1937, in Meadow, Texas, had roots in music that stretched back to the birth of rock and roll. In the ’50s, he was a part of Buddy Holly’s Decca recordings, playing alongside the rocker and even opening for Elvis Presley.
In 1958, Curtis joined Holly’s band the Crickets, but Holly’s tragic death in a 1959 plane crash that also killed Ritchie Valens, the Big Bopper, and the pilot sidelined the group until 1960.
During this time, Curtis wrote the classic “Walk Right Back,” a 1961 smash for the Everly Brothers.
The next Crickets album, “In Style with the Crickets,” contained Curtis’s songs “I Fought the Law” (later covered indelibly by the Bobby Fuller Four in 1966) and “More Than I Can Say” (a hit for Leo Sayer in 1980).
Curtis remained with the Crickets as lead singer and guitarist off and on for most of his life, until 2015.
Perhaps the most famous song he ever wrote and performed wound up being “Love Is All Around,” the theme song to TV’s “Mary Tyler Moore.” He said he wrote it off a pitch for the show, focusing on the idea that Moore’s character had to struggle to pay her rent out on her own. Its instantly familiar lyrics have made it a consistent pick for best TV theme of all time.
Along with his solo work and Crickets appearances, he was an in-demand writer of TV jingles.
Curtis and fellow Crickets Jerry Allison, Joe B. Mauldin and Niki Sullivan were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012, after having been snubbed when Buddy Holly was added in 1986. He was also an inductee into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1991.
Curtis is survived by his wife of 50+ years Louise.
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