Sam Moore, who was the higher voice of the 1960s duo Sam & Dave, influenced musicians including Michael Jackson, Al Green and Bruce Springsteen, has passed away in Florida
Sam Moore – best known as member of the legendary soul and R&B duo Sam & Dave – has died at the age of 89.
Moore influenced iconic musicians including Michael Jackson, Al Green and Bruce Springsteen as he and Dave Prater delivered gritty, gospel-infused performances, often considered one of the greatest live acts of the 1960s.
The duo sang hits including “Soul Man” and “Hold On, I’m Comin’,” and helped create a resurgence of popularity for soul, R&B, and blues in the 1980s.
But Moore died on Friday morning in Coral Gables, Florida, due to complications while recovering from surgery, his publicist Jeremy Westby said today.
Moore and Prater were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. Prior to this, the pair were second only to Otis Redding at the Memphis, Tennessee-based Stax Records. They transformed the “call and response” of gospel music into a frenzied stage show and recorded some of soul music’s most enduring hits, which also included “You Don’t Know Like I Know,” “When Something is Wrong With My Baby” and “I Thank You.”
Most Sam & Dave’s hits were written and produced by the team of Isaac Hayes and David Porter and featured the Stax house band Booker T. & the MGs, whose guitarist Steve Cropper received one of music’s most famous shoutouts when Sam & Dave called “Play it, Steve” midway through “Soul Man.”
Like many ’60s soul acts, Sam & Dave faded after the 1960s. But “Soul Man” hit the charts again in the late 1970s when the Blues Brothers, John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd, recorded it with many of the same musicians. Moore, from Miami, Florida, had mixed feelings about the hit becoming associated with the “Saturday Night Live” stars, remembering how young people believed it originated with the Blues Brothers.
But it gave Sam & Dave a new lease of life and their success waxed again until the band, formed in Miami, split in 1981. By this point, they’d had two number ones in the US and came to prominence in the UK with Soul Sister Brown Sugar, which reached 15th in our charts.
Prater, who was the deeper vocalist, died in 1988, aged just 50, following a car crash in Sycamore, Georgia. In 2008, the movie “Soul Men” depicted a pair of aging, estranged singers who bore more than a little resemblance to Sam & Dave. Moore lost a lawsuit claiming the resemblance was too close.
Moore, who started singing in church, forged a friendship with Prater when he helped coach him on the lyrics of a song and they quickly became a popular local duo in Miami. They signed with Atlantic Records in 1965 when Moore was 30 and Prater just 28.
Moore married his wife, Joyce, in 1982, and the couple share a daughter and two grandchildren. Reflecting on his life in an interview in 2006, Moore credited Joyce for helping him kick a drug addiction towards the end of his professional career. After which, Moore would perform on cruise ships and at functions for presidents, including Barack Obama.
The grandfather said: “I did a lot of cruise ships, I did a lot of oldies shows. That’s funny to think back to it now. And I did a lot of shows where if I did a show with an oldie show, I had to actually audition.
“But you know what? You keep your mouth shut and you get up there and you sing as hard and perform as hard as you can, and get the little money and go on about your business and try and pay those bills. I’m laughing about it now, but at that time, man, it was really serious.”
