RIFF Magazine

OBITUARY: David Crosby, melodious heart of the Byrds and CSNY, dead at 81

David Crosby

David Crosby, courtesy Anna Webber.

Iconic ’60s singer-songwriter and guitarist David Crosby has died, his family announced Thursday. The cofounder of The Byrds and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young was 81. A cause of death was not announced.

“It is with great sadness after a long illness, that our beloved David (Croz) Crosby has passed away,” Crosby’s wife, Jan Dance, told Variety. “He was lovingly surrounded by his wife and soulmate Jan and son Django. Although he is no longer here with us, his humanity and kind soul will continue to guide and inspire us. His legacy will continue to live on through his legendary music. Peace, love, and harmony to all who knew David and those he touched. We will miss him dearly. At this time, we respectfully and kindly ask for privacy as we grieve and try to deal with our profound loss. Thank you for the love and prayers.”

Crosby was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of fame with both the bands he co-founded. He first found success with The Byrds in 1964, for a time, America’s answer to the Beatles.



The musician was the son of Oscar-winning Hollywood cinematographer Floyd Crosby. He was drawn to the arts at an early age and dropped out of college to pursue music. After playing in other bands and as a solo artist, he wound up playing with Roger McGuinn and Gene Clark as the Jet Set. The trio released one song that flopped before the band rebranded as The Byrds, adding Chris Hillman and Michael Clarke.

The Byrds were the prototypical L.A. folk scene group. Crosby was never the chief songwriter in the group, but his soaring vocals came to be a winning hallmark for The Byrds’ biggest songs like Bob Dylan cover “Mr. Tambourine Man” (the group’s first single under The Byrds moniker) and “Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season).” The former hit No. 1. on the U.S. singles chart the following year, while the band’s debut album reached No. 6. Each of the Byrds’ next five albums through 1968’s The Notorious Byrd Brothers—Crosby’s last with the group—reached the top 25.

He was fired from the band in 1967 following the commercial disappointments of his original songs and his tempestuous personality. A performance at the famed Monterey Pop Festival that year is often cited as a boiling point that led to his dismissal. The rest of the band was reportedly enraged at Crosby’s political on-stage comments, and his later appearance as a guest with Buffalo Springfield (with future bandmates Neil Young and Stephen Stills).



Crosby’s next project was a collaboration with Stills and Graham Nash of the English band the Hollies in 1968. An early version of a supergroup, Crosby, Stills & Nash were already scorching hot with a multiplatinum debut before they added Neil Young a year later.

The band infamously clashed over egos, driving the era of sex, drugs and rock and roll, breaking up and reforming several times, but not before becoming one of the biggest rock bands of the time. Crosby had several original compositions on the band’s 1969 debut album, including “Guinnevere” (partly inspired by his ex-lover Joni Mitchell) and “Long Time Gone.” The album sold 4 million copies and reached the No. 6 spot on the U.S. albums chart.

Its second live performance was with Neil Young at Woodstock. Now known as Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, the group reached a new high with 1970’s Déjà Vu, which went all the way to the top spot on the albums chart. The following year, a live double-album, 4-Way Street, also reached No. 1 and was certified quadruple-platinum.

“I know people tend to focus on how volatile our relationship has been at times, but what has always mattered to David and me more than anything was the pure joy of the music we created together, the sound we discovered with one another, and the deep friendship we shared over all these many long years,” Nash wrote on Instagram on Thursday. “David was fearless in life and in music. He leaves behind a tremendous void as far as sheer personality and talent in this world. He spoke his mind, his heart, and his passion through his beautiful music and leaves an incredible legacy. These are the things that matter most.”



David Crosby’s addiction to cocaine, heroin and alcohol began to drive a wedge between the members. Young temporarily left the band in 1970. Over the next 12 years, the band would release two more successful albums, CSN and Daylight Again, before Crosby’s life imploded in 1982 with an arrest at a Dallas nightclub and charges of gun and drug possession.

Then in 1985, he was arrested again on suspicion for driving under the influence of alcohol. He was sentenced in 1986 for the drug and gun charges and served five months of a five-year sentence in prison.

At a Montana show in 1984, before his arrest, Crosby needed a stool on stage and appeared listless much of the time. In 1991, at a Crosby, Stills & Nash acoustic show at the Warfield in San Francisco, he was cheerful and ebullient, even razzing Nash at one point about “dipping into the Hollies’ songbook.” He seemed born again, a whole new person, from what we’d seen less than a decade earlier.

He had additional minor drug and firearm arrests in later years, though he’d said he never turned to hard drugs like cocaine after his time in prison. In 1994, he underwent a liver transplant after many years of hard living.

Crosby, Still, Nash & Young famously performed numerous times at the Bay Area’s Bridge School Benefit concert, produced by Young and his then-wife Pegi for a school for disabled children. Through Young and other musicians who came up in the ’60s and ’70s, Crosby had a strong connection to the Bay Area.

Outside of CSNY, he remained active making solo records. His most recent studio album was 2021’s For Free, named after a Joni Mitchell song. In late 2022, he released a live album, David Crosby & The Lighthouse Band Live at the Capitol Theatre.

Besides music, Crosby has sporadically acted throughout his life. In the ’90s, he appeared on TV shows “Roseanne” and “The John Larroquette Show” and the film “Hook.” He’s also appeared on “The Simpsons.” Crosby wrote two memoirs: 1988’s “Long Time Gone” and 2007’s “Since Then: How I Survived Everything and Lived to Tell About It.” In 2018, filmmaker Cameron Crowe made a documentary about him, “David Crosby: Remember My Name.”



He’s remained active on social media, often inserting dry wit, and just earlier this week poking fun at heaven: “I heard the place is overrated…cloudy,” he tweeted.

In 2000, singer-songwriter Melissa Etheridge revealed that Crosby was the biological father of two children born to her then-partner Julie Cypher via artificial insemination. One of them, Beckett Cypher, died in 2020 at 21 from after battling opioid addiction. Crosby survived by his wife, their son Django; and son James Raymond, and two daughters, Erika and Donovan, from previous relationships.





Sam Richards contributed to this story. Follow editor Roman Gokhman at Twitter.com/RomiTheWriter.

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