Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts dies at 80

Charlie Watts, drummer for the Rolling Stones, dies at age 80, as confirmed by his agent. The musician of the mythical band composed by Mick Jagger, Brian Jones (who died in 1969), Keith Richards and Bill Wyman has died in London surrounded by loved ones.

“It is with great sadness that we announce the death of our beloved Charlie Watts,” his agent said in a statement, adding that he “passed quietly in a London hospital today, surrounded by his family.”

Watts (London, 1941) suffered from health ailments since he suffered throat cancer in 2004. At the beginning of summer, a relapse in his health condition was announced that would separate him from the next tour of the British group scheduled for the autumn. A spokesman explained the reasons at the time: “Charlie was operated successfully, but his doctors believe that he needs to rest,” he explained then, without further elaboration.

The drummer, who turned 80 in June, Been with the Stones since 1963. Along with singer Mick Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards, Charlie Watts was one of the oldest members of the famous rock band, in which Mick Taylor, Ronnie Wood and Bill Wyman have also participated.

In 2004, Watts was treated at London’s Royal Marsden Hospital for throat cancer, from which he recovered after a four-month battle with the disease, including six weeks of intensive radiation therapy.

“Charlie was a loving husband, father and grandfather and also, as a member of the Rolling Stones, one of the greatest drummers of his generation,” said Doherty. “We ask that the privacy of his family, band members and close friends be respected at this difficult time,” he added.

The most restrained

Watts, who always stayed away from the crazy life that his peers lived, remained for more than half a century the unflappable metronome of the band while fueling their passion for jazz.

With his impassive face and unanimously recognized talent for binary rhythm, he provided the perfect onstage counterpoint to the frenetic swaggering of Mick Jagger and the electric antics of guitarists Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood.

And while his friends went through “divorces, addictions, arrests and crazy fights”, according to an inventory compiled by the British newspaper Mirror, quiet Charlie Watts lived a serene life with Shirley Shepherd, his wife of 50 years, and their daughter Seraphina, on their Arabian thoroughbred breeding farm in Devon, England.

“During fifty years of chaos, drummer Charlie Watts represented calm amidst the Rolling Stones storm, both on and off stage,” wrote the Mirror in 2012.

However, the musician was not totally impervious to the band’s addictions: In the 1980s, he underwent rehab for heroin and alcohol. But “it was a very short time for me,” he explained. “I just quit, it wasn’t something for me,” confesses the taciturn musician.