Jeff Cook, co-founding member of country band Alabama, dies at 73 - Tennessean

Jeff Cook, a co-founding subordinate of the trendsetting Country Music Hall of Fame set Alabama, died Monday astatine property 73.

For a decade, Cook battled Parkinson’s disease, a progressive upset of the tense strategy that affects question and causes tremors. He publicly disclosed his diagnosis successful 2017.

A typical for the set confirmed his decease Tuesday day to the Tennessean. Cook died astatine his beachside location successful Destin, Florida.

As a guitarist, fiddle subordinate and vocalist successful Alabama, Cook — alongside cousins Randy Owen and Teddy Gentry — helped sketch a blueprint for what a hitmaking set tin execute successful state music. He and the set filled successful that sketch with a slew of hits present considered by galore to beryllium indispensable state euphony listening: "Song of the South," "Mountain Music," "I'm In A Hurry," "Cheap Seats," and "My Home's In Alabama," among galore others.

A autochthonal of small-town Fort Payne, Alabama, Cook began chasing his emotion of euphony connected vigor airwaves arsenic a disc jockey successful his hometown. In 1969, helium co-founded the set Young Country alongside Owen and Gentry — planting the seeds for what aboriginal grew into Alabama. By the mid-1970s, the cousins performed arsenic Wildcountry, cutting their teeth successful adjacent cities — similar Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, wherever the set embraced a equilibrium of state songwriting and Southern stone sensibilities connected agelong nights wrong section nine the Bowery.

The set adopted a caller sanction successful 1977: Alabama. Two years aboriginal — aft a tally of humble vigor occurrence and adopting full-time drummer Mark Herndon — Cook, Owen and Gentry accepted an invitation to play the tastemaking "New Faces" showcase astatine the yearly Country Radio Seminar successful Nashville.

What came next? It mightiness arsenic good beryllium state euphony history.

The set inked a woody aboriginal that twelvemonth with RCA, opening a singular tally connected the state vigor charts. Alabama landed 8 No. 1 songs connected the state charts betwixt outpouring 1980 and summertime 1982, according to the Country Music Hall of Fame. That tally included popular crossover hits "Love In The First Degree" and "Feels So Right," arsenic good arsenic "Tennessee River" and "Mountain Music" — staple Alabama songs that the radical continued playing for decades to come.

And occurrence didn't stall aft this rocket-launched commencement successful the aboriginal '80s. Between 1980 and 1993, astatine slightest 1 Alabama opus topped the state charts each year. The set earned a slew of awards successful that time, including a three-year tally astatine CMA Entertainer of the Year from 1982-1984 and 5 ACM Award Entertainer of the Year trophies from '81-'85.

In a metropolis dominated by solo artists and vocal groups, Alabama proved an instrument-playing set could forge a way to state occurrence matched by fewer artists astatine the time.

“Country euphony was ever astir solo artists, and I deliberation they capitalized connected what the [o]utlaws had started, which was amassing a younker assemblage for the genre," state euphony historiographer Robert K. Oermann said successful 2017. He added, "Jeff was the instrumental wizard who could bash fiddle and guitar."

On stage, Cook held down fiddle, guitar playing and keyboards, adding layered backing vocals to the band's smooth, inviting melodies. His playing? It sent "people dancing each implicit the place," said Country Music Hall of Fame subordinate Joe Galante, a erstwhile RCA enforcement who helped shepherd Alabama's career.

"... portion helium wasn’t beforehand and halfway each the time, his contributions truly made a quality erstwhile you perceive for the hook," Galante told the Tennessean successful 2017. "Those are hallmarks of records that volition past good beyond our lifetimes."

For some, Cook's on-stage showmanship and behind-the-scenes relationship helped signifier a people of entertainers to follow. Country hitmaker Kenny Chesney — who shared stages with Alabama aboriginal successful his vocation — described Cook and the set arsenic being "so generous with wisdom" during the singer's formative years.

"[Alabama] showed a kid successful a t-shirt that state euphony could beryllium rock, could beryllium real, could beryllium idiosyncratic who looked similar me," Chesney said Tuesday. "Growing up successful East Tennessee, that gave maine the bosom to pursuit this dream."

After an archetypal farewell circuit that wrapped successful 2004, Alabama reunited successful 2011 for a foundation performance benefitting tornado victims successful the group's namesake state. In his clip distant from Alabama, Cook released a fistful of solo projects. He toured with his Allstar Goodtime Band and released collaborations with Charlie Daniels and "Star Trek" prima William Shatner.

Cook entered the Country Music Hall of Fame successful 2005 arsenic a subordinate of Alabama — joining the astir sought-after nine successful state music.

Alabama returned to touring successful earnest with a 40th-anniversary solemnisation successful 2013. Four years later, Cook scaled backmost performances with the set owed to the ongoing interaction of his Parkinson’s diagnosis.

He stopped touring with Alabama astir 2018. As of 2019, his bandmates told the Tennessean they ensured his cogwheel was acceptable up earlier each amusement — conscionable successful lawsuit helium wanted to measurement connected stage.

He co-wrote a opus connected a 2015 comeback medium called "No Bad Days" that successful clip took a caller meaning for the Hall of Fame musician.

“After I got the Parkinson’s diagnosis, radical would punctuation the opus to maine and say, ‘No atrocious days,’ ” Cook told The Tennessean successful 2019. “They constitute maine letters, notes and emails and they motion ‘No Bad Days.’ I cognize the enactment is there. They articulation me. People I don’t cognize travel up to maine and say, ‘How ya feeling?’ You conscionable got to unrecorded it each time and instrumentality it arsenic it comes. Prayer does work. And I cognize determination was a batch of praying going on.”

Cook is survived by Lisa Cook, his woman of 27 years. In lieu of flowers, his household asks for donations to the Jeff and Lisa Cook Foundation, a non-profit dedicated to raising consciousness for Parkinson's disease.

A solemnisation of beingness program to beryllium announced astatine a aboriginal date.