Goodbye to Quincy Jones, Michael Jackson’s historic producer, passes away at 91

The icons of the twentieth century are slowly starting to step aside and leave this world. The latest one is Quincy Jonesone of the most famous music producers and composers of all time, best known for having worked on the most famous records dMichael Jackson and for collaborating with artists such as Frank Sinatra and Count Basie. Jones passes away at the age of 91 after a career dotted with countless awards and recognitions, managed to go down in history for having produced Jacksonian masterpieces such as Thriller (1982), Off the Wall (1979) e Bad (1987) but also for producing films The color purple (1985), nominated for 11 Oscars, and television series such as Willy, the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

Born in Chicago in 1933, Quincy Jones approached music at a very young age, entering jazz circles by learning to play the trumpet as a teenager. After studying at Berklee in Boston, he began working steadily as an arranger and composer in the 1950s following important orchestras as well as for television and music labels, perfecting his studies in Paris. In the 1960s he became vice president of the Mercury record company and began working as composer of soundtracks for cinema, especially for detective films like In cold blood, Getaway! And An Italian shot.

Quincy Jones in 2019Arnold Turner/Getty Images

After many years spent working with some of the most important singers of American jazz, from Sarah Vaughan to Billy Eckstine, from Ella Fitzgerald to Frank Sinatra, the turning point for Quincy Jones came in 1978 when, on the set of the film I’m Magic, he meets Michael Jackson with whom he works on the album Off the Wall. It is the beginning of a partnership that will lead Jones to also produce the singer’s next two albums Thrillerthe best-selling in history. Thanks to the collaboration with Jackson, Quincy Jones becomes one of the most prominent personalities of American pop culture as well one of the most powerful African-American men in the industry of US entertainment, not to mention behind the global success of We are the Worldthe famous song sung for charity by some of the most famous musicians of all time in 1985, also has a hand in it.