Eric Carmen, the singer, songwriter and onetime Raspberries frontman, died in his sleep over the weekend. He was 74. The news was shared by his wife, Amy, via his official website: “It is with tremendous sadness that we share the heartbreaking news of the passing of Eric Carmen. Our sweet, loving and talented Eric passed away in his sleep, over the weekend. It brought him great joy to know, that for decades, his music touched so many and will be his lasting legacy.”
Born August 11, 1949 in Cleveland, Eric was involved in music from a very early age, being enrolled in the Dalcroze Eurhythmics program at the Cleveland Institute of Music when he was just three and taking violin lessons at six. It was the rock n’ roll boom of the early ’60s that really sparked him, though, and he was in bands in his early teens. He was a founding member of Cleveland’s The Raspberries, who took cues from The Beatles but laid the building blocks for what would later be dubbed “power pop,” detailing teenage romance on chiming, hook-filled songs like “Go All the Way” (#5 in 1972), “Let’s Pretend”, and “I Wanna Be with You.”
When the Raspberries broke up in 1975, Carmen found success as a solo artist with a string of ballads and mid-tempo rock songs that really showed off his vocal range, including “All By Myself, “Never Gonna Fall in Love Again,” and “Change of Heart.” He scored one of his biggest hits in 1987 with “Hungry Eyes” off the Dirty Dancing soundtrack.
Rest in peace, Eric.