Isaac Hayes - Succumbs At 65

They say death always comes in threes (number one was Bernie Mac) and now my beloved Isaac Hayes. Soul singer and arranger Isaac Hayes, who won Grammy awards and an Oscar for the theme from the 1971 action film "Shaft," has died, sheriff's officials in Memphis, Tennessee, reported Sunday. Relatives found Hayes, 65, unconscious in his home next to a still-running treadmill, said Steve Schular, a spokesman for the Shelby County Sheriff's Department. Paramedics attempted to revive him and took him to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead shortly after 2 p.m.

Hayes born in Covington, Tennessee and raised by his grandparents, grew up very poor and ofter referred to his days of picking cotton in his song monologues. He was a longtime songwriter and arranger for Stax Records in Memphis, playing in the studio's backup band and crafting tunes for artists such as Otis Redding, The Emotions and Sam and Dave to name a few in the 1960s with his collaborator David Porter.

Besides his musical career, Hayes had a long running television and movie career dating back to the early 1970's. He appeared in films and television, such as, "Truck Turner", "The Rockford Files", "I Gonna Git You Sucka", "Hammer, Slammer, and Slade", but is probably best known as the animated character "Chef" on the long running cartoon "South Park".

Isaac and I go back so far that I feel like we are old friends although we have never met. I actually had the extreme please of seeing him live back in 2003 at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Amphitheater along with the band WAR. I throughly enjoyed the show, in which he performed all of his classic, including of course the "Theme From Shaft".

He is survived by his wife, 12 children, 14 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren. Enjoy this live clip from 1973 of Hayes performing his Oscar winning "Theme From Shaft".