A fatal game of Russian roulette, on-stage deaths, and a high-speed motorcycle crash
are just a few of the tragedies that have haunted the members of Chicago.
Terry Kath was a founding member of Chicago,
playing hard-charging guitar on the band's first 11 albums. While not always the frontman,
Kath helped form the band's sound and identity. His tragic death devastated Chicago,
both professionally and personally. As his bandmate Robert Lamm told the Chicago Tribune,
"Terry really drove the band rhythmically. His importance
to this band could never be underestimated."
Kath attended a party at the home of Chicago road crew member Don Johnson. After a day of drinking,
and after all the other guests had left, Kath brought out the handgun he regularly kept on
his person. He started to spin it around and play with it, much to Jonson's consternation.
According to The New York Times, Kath assured his host the gun was not loaded before placing
the firearm to his head and squeezing the trigger. Tragically, there was a bullet in the
chamber. It entered Kath's brain and instantly killed him. The rock star was 32 years old.
"We had this mindset in the band, 'Well, we're all men. We know our limitations.' That was bull----."
Chicago's multi-instrumentalist Walt Parazaider turned in one
of the longest tenures with a single band in rock music history. In 1967,
he teamed up with a few fellow music students from DePaul University and formed the group
Chicago Transit Authority. Eventually, that same project became known simply as Chicago.
One of just a few founding members who'd stick with the group for as long as possible,
Parazaider played saxophone and flute in Chicago for 50 years. However,
he retired from playing live with the band 2017 due to a serious heart ailment.
Any hope of Paradaizer ever returning to Chicago would fade, owing to another health
issue. In April 2021, Parazaider wrote a news post on Chicago's website announcing that he'd
been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, a progressive neurological disease that
impedes movement and is characterized by severe memory loss and confusion.
In the late 1960s, Bill Champlin formed the San Francisco-based rock-and-horns band Sons
of Champlin. In 1981, the instrumentalist took his guitar, keyboards, and voice over
to the similarly orchestral Chicago right as they were evolving into a mainstream pop band.
Champlin stayed with Chicago until 2009, later joining with fellow band exile Danny Seraphine
in California Transit Authority. The supergroup played a series of cancer research and treatment
benefit concerts in 2018 — a cause which was of particularly personal importance to Champlin.
In 2014, Champlin's son, musician Brad Champlin, was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. Two years
later, he died at age 51. Unsurprisingly, this was a heartbreaking blow for his father.
Just one day before his son's death, Bill Champlin received
his own cancer diagnosis. Already in mourning, he spent a year away from
music to treat advanced-stage cancer through radiation, chemotherapy regimens, and surgery.
Percussionist Laudir de Oliveira was born and raised in Brazil and got a big break when he
joined a troupe headed by globally popular bandleader Sergio Mendes in the mid-1960s.
Following a move to the United States, he played on Joe Cocker's hit "Feelin' Alright."
When Chicago was looking to incorporate South American musical traditions into its sound,
they invited the percussionist to play on Chicago VI and Chicago VII, and thereafter
made him an official member of the group. When Chicago went fully pop in 1982, de Oliveira
was dismissed and returned to Brazil, resuming his career as a session musician and sideman.
By September 2017, he was regularly playing alongside Brazilian musician
Jovi Joviniano. In an interview with O Globo,
Joviniano recalled that one night he looked over at de Oliveira during a performance to
find him face down on his instrument. He was pronounced dead at the scene at the age of 77.
In 1995, session guitarist Keith Howland joined Chicago, playing on records and on
their regular concert tours as they segued from hitmakers into a legacy act. In a band
with a consistently changing membership that allowed it to continue for more than 50 years,
Howland wound up the longest-serving guitarist in Chicago's lengthy history. However,
his tenure with the band came to an abrupt end 26 years later.
Just before taking the stage for a concert in Louisville, Kentucky in November 2021,
Howland suffered an accident that left his arm so
broken that he was unable to play guitar for the foreseeable future.
A replacement played with Chicago for the band's remaining tour dates, but after the announcement
of a 2022 tour, Howland bowed out. He announced his departure in a Facebook post, writing,
"I have given serious thought in the last few weeks and honestly as
to what my future might look like. I can't play the guitar right now,
and it's probably going to be several months before I can get back to anything normal."
Over the first two decades of Chicago's career, Peter Cetera was the group's breakout star.
Primarily a bass player, he also took lead vocal duties on some of the band's best-known songs,
including "25 or 6 to 4" and "If You Leave Me Now." In 1985, he left the
band to pursue a very successful career as a soft rock balladeer.
"And then musically we just sort of parted ways.
In July 1995, after moving to a new record label and recording his fifth studio album,
Cetera was involved in a severe vehicular crash. He told the Los Angeles Times,
"I got in this pretty serious motorcycle accident. I had 60 stitches in my face,
and I spent the next two to three months I was originally going to
go on the road just sort of wondering what my face was going to look like."
Cetera recalled that he'd been traveling at about 55 miles per hour on his motorcycle
when the crash occurred. While he's got some scars from the incident,
the bassist considers himself fortunate to have survived.
Following the departure of Peter Cetera in 1985, 23-year-old Jason Scheff joined Chicago
as the band's new lead singer. According to The Saratogian, at the same time,
Scheff was grappling with what he'd referred to as "youthful bad habits," – chiefly a
dependency on alcohol that he picked up during long stretches of unemployment.
When he made it into Chicago, he found that he was still drinking so heavily
it began to affect his entire life. Less than a year after joining Chicago,
Scheff told his bandmates mid-tour he needed to take a break to seek
treatment. He told the Santa Clarita Valley Signal he entered a rehab facility in 1986.
Members of Chicago were hesitant to let Scheff go. The band initially tried to talk him down
from departing, but he left for treatment anyway. Scheff remained in Chicago until 2016,
and according to his blog, he's never had a relapse into substance abuse.