Jaki Liebezeit, best known as a founding member of Can, has died aged 78.
The news was confirmed tonight via a post on Can’s official Facebook page. "It is with great sadness we have to announce that Jaki passed away this morning from sudden pneumonia," says the post. "He fell asleep peacefully, surrounded by his loved ones. We will miss him hugely."
While Liebezeit was best known as a drummer for Can, he was also part of Manfred Schoof’s Quintet in the 1960s, a group which were early experimenters of European free jazz. He worked with musicians such as Brian Eno, Neu!’s Michael Rother, Depeche Mode and Jah Wobble across his career too.
He had been due to reunite with Can’s Irmin Schmidt and Malcolm Mooney in April for a show at the Barbican titled ‘The Can Project’, which was set to see the three musicians collaborating with a number of other musicians and performing classic material live.
