Remembering 2024’s Music Losses: Dickey Betts

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The new year is here. As we move ahead, we also look back, and that’s what the month of January is for with these two countdowns. I’ll be presenting 31 people from the world of music who passed away last year, as well as 31 others who may or may not have caught your attention. I’ll start alphabetically and give the “top” ten at the end. Here we go with the music. Dickey Betts People down in Georgia come from near and far To hear Richard Betts pickin’ on that red guitar (Charlie Daniels, “The South’s Gonna Do It”) Oh, you think you don’t know him? I promise you, if you’ve listened to “classic rock” radio, you’ve heard Dickey Betts. He was the lead vocalist and songwriter on the Allman Brothers’ biggest hit, “Ramblin’ Man.” He also wrote “Jessica,” the classic instrumental in the Allman Brothers’ career. There’s one thing about southern rock: all roads go through Macon, Georgia. That’s where the Allman Brothers Band was based, and they are, in essence, the band that gave rise to the popularity of the genre we now know as southern rock. Although plagued by tragedy (Duane Allman and Berry Oakley died in eerily similar ways within two blocks and one year of each other), they endured and remain the cornerstone on which southern rock was built. Betts’ passing leaves one member of the original Allman Brothers — Jai Johanny Johanson — still with us. The music will always be there, so “Eat a Peach.” Dickey Betts Born Forrest Richard Betts December 12, 1943, West Palm Beach, Florida Died April 18, 2024, Osprey, Florida (cancer/COPD) (age 80) HALL OF FAME: Rock and Roll (with the Allman Brothers), 1995 The legendary “Ramblin’ Man” (no, NJ Chic, that’s not Jimmy Buffett, no matter what the mustache makes you think ):