Welcome to DU!
The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards.
Join the community:
Create a free account
Support DU (and get rid of ads!):
Become a Star Member
Latest Breaking News
Editorials & Other Articles
General Discussion
The DU Lounge
All Forums
Issue Forums
Culture Forums
Alliance Forums
Region Forums
Support Forums
Help & Search
Folk singer Tucker Zimmerman, admired by Bowie and produced by Tony Visconti, died tragically in a house fire 2 days ago
I posted about Tucker in December of 2024, after hearing a podcast with him talking with Tony: https://www.democraticunderground.com/1034134188 .
Found out just this morning, looking at Tony's Facebook page, that Tucker and his wife had died tragically in a house fire on the 17th. Tony posted this yesterday, and I'm typing it because for some reason I can't copy and paste from the page.
https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=10242530908591603&id=1312292203
I just received tragic news from Quanah Zimmerman, the son of singer and songwriter Tucker Zimmerman. Tucker and his wonderful wife, Marie-Claire perished in a house fire yesterday. I am stunned. I met Tucker and Marie-Claire in London, 1967. Tucker was a master musician and song writer from San Francisco. His songs were biting and revolutionary. I produced his first album, Ten Songs by Tucker Zimmerman. We had met up several times over the decades and made a podcast recently. He was one of my oldest friends. David Bowie adored him. Tucker played a set of his songs at the Three Tuns in Beckenham, Kent and David gave him a proper psychedelic light show during David's Arts Lab night. If you haven't heard Tucker's music, it was like a very dark version of Bob Dylan. I'm all choked up.
From Paste magazine yesterday:
https://www.pastemagazine.com/article/r-i-p-tucker-zimmerman-cult-folk-hero-dead-at-84
R.I.P. Tucker Zimmerman: Cult folk hero dead at 84
By Matt Mitchell | January 18, 2026 | 12:52pm
In a post shared to his Instagram page, management has confirmed via Belgian media that Tucker Zimmerman and his wife Marie-Claire have passed away. Tucker was 84 years old, and his death date is listed as January 17, 2026: “There are very sad reports from Belgian media this morning regarding a tragedy,” the post reads. “They report Marie-Claire and Tucker have lost their lives. Our love and prayers go to their family. When there is more news from the family we will post again. Love to all.” This morning, I located and translated a Belgian news article posted on January 17 that reports Tucker and Marie-Claire “lost their lives to asphyxiation after a fire broke out in their home.”
I had the great honor of writing about Zimmerman when he released his last album, Dance of Love, in 2024. He was a kind, patient man who graciously spoke about his life in music. During our conversation, Marie-Claire (who Zimmerman lovingly called “Bear”) would roam in the background, pulling books off shelves or tidying up their “cubby hole.” She sang on “Leave It On the Porch Outside,” a stroke of normalcy for her and Zimmerman. “We sing a lot together around the house,” he told me. “In the ‘70s, when I was doing many of those gigs across Belgium and Germany, she was driving me—because I don’t drive—so I asked her to come on stage and we would just reproduce a couple of songs—what we’d done at the house, singing together, harmonies. She sang quite a bit with me in public during the ‘70s, and she’s even on a couple of the albums from during that time.” And, as I wrote two years ago, through their shared music, we got to step into their lifetime and share that intimacy with them.
Most people knew of David Bowie’s feelings about Zimmerman, that the Thin White Duke thought of him to be “way too qualified for folk [music]” and considered Ten Songs by Tucker Zimmerman to be one of his favorite albums ever. But Zimmerman was more than that. I wrote in 2024 that “because his music was a little off-the-nose and zany 55 years ago, some folks—even Bowie—used to say that Zimmerman wanted to be like another Zimmerman, Bob Dylan. His body of work supports the opposite, as he walked on as a cult troubadour particularly drawn to scuffling drum beats, steel guitars gleaned from busking resonance and a magic wreathed in well-worn obscurity.”
Zimmerman was born in San Francisco during World War II. He took violin lessons as a child but liked the piano better. He hated taking lessons, preferring to copy Little Richard and Fats Domino instead. He went to school for composition and even got a Fulbright Scholarship to study theory under Gofreddo Petrassi in Rome. Zimmerman dodged the Vietnam War draft, left America, and didn’t come back for years and years. While in Rome, he realized that he cared more about writing songs than composing for orchestras. “I used the scholarship as a free ride, but I made use of it. I didn’t waste it,” he told me. “I wrote a lot of songs, and my head got around to the right place—as to what I wanted to do with my life.”
-snip-
By Matt Mitchell | January 18, 2026 | 12:52pm
In a post shared to his Instagram page, management has confirmed via Belgian media that Tucker Zimmerman and his wife Marie-Claire have passed away. Tucker was 84 years old, and his death date is listed as January 17, 2026: “There are very sad reports from Belgian media this morning regarding a tragedy,” the post reads. “They report Marie-Claire and Tucker have lost their lives. Our love and prayers go to their family. When there is more news from the family we will post again. Love to all.” This morning, I located and translated a Belgian news article posted on January 17 that reports Tucker and Marie-Claire “lost their lives to asphyxiation after a fire broke out in their home.”
I had the great honor of writing about Zimmerman when he released his last album, Dance of Love, in 2024. He was a kind, patient man who graciously spoke about his life in music. During our conversation, Marie-Claire (who Zimmerman lovingly called “Bear”) would roam in the background, pulling books off shelves or tidying up their “cubby hole.” She sang on “Leave It On the Porch Outside,” a stroke of normalcy for her and Zimmerman. “We sing a lot together around the house,” he told me. “In the ‘70s, when I was doing many of those gigs across Belgium and Germany, she was driving me—because I don’t drive—so I asked her to come on stage and we would just reproduce a couple of songs—what we’d done at the house, singing together, harmonies. She sang quite a bit with me in public during the ‘70s, and she’s even on a couple of the albums from during that time.” And, as I wrote two years ago, through their shared music, we got to step into their lifetime and share that intimacy with them.
Most people knew of David Bowie’s feelings about Zimmerman, that the Thin White Duke thought of him to be “way too qualified for folk [music]” and considered Ten Songs by Tucker Zimmerman to be one of his favorite albums ever. But Zimmerman was more than that. I wrote in 2024 that “because his music was a little off-the-nose and zany 55 years ago, some folks—even Bowie—used to say that Zimmerman wanted to be like another Zimmerman, Bob Dylan. His body of work supports the opposite, as he walked on as a cult troubadour particularly drawn to scuffling drum beats, steel guitars gleaned from busking resonance and a magic wreathed in well-worn obscurity.”
Zimmerman was born in San Francisco during World War II. He took violin lessons as a child but liked the piano better. He hated taking lessons, preferring to copy Little Richard and Fats Domino instead. He went to school for composition and even got a Fulbright Scholarship to study theory under Gofreddo Petrassi in Rome. Zimmerman dodged the Vietnam War draft, left America, and didn’t come back for years and years. While in Rome, he realized that he cared more about writing songs than composing for orchestras. “I used the scholarship as a free ride, but I made use of it. I didn’t waste it,” he told me. “I wrote a lot of songs, and my head got around to the right place—as to what I wanted to do with my life.”
-snip-
Much more at that link.
RIP, Tucker and Marie-Claire.
1 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
