Maggie Roche obit

Maggie Roche, Who Harmonized With Her Singing Sisters, Dies at 65

 

She was not on the list.

Maggie Roche, one-third of family band the Roches, has died. Roche’s sister and bandmate Suzzy confirmed the news in the below Facebook note, saying she died after a long battle with cancer. She was 65. “She was a private person, too sensitive and shy for this world, but brimming with life, love, and talent,” the note reads. “I want to let you know how grateful she was to everyone who listened and understood her through her music and her songs. ... It’ll be hard for me to carry on without her.”

The Roches grew up in Park Ridge, New Jersey. In 1973, Maggie and sister Terre sang back-up on Paul Simon’s album There Goes Rhymin’ Simon. They were signed to Columbia Records as a duo and released their album Seductive Reasoning in 1975. Their younger sister Suzzy joined them to form the Roches. Their first self-titled album as a trio, produced by Robert Fripp, was released in 1979. The trio continued recording and performing until their final album Moonswept was released in 2007.

“Hammond Song” was listed on Pitchfork’s “200 Best Songs of the 1970s.”

As Ann Powers noted earlier this year, Roche and her sisters wrote songs "about pregnancy, work, family tensions, complex love and the feminine mystique [that] gained clarity from the utterly clear, deliberately imperfect harmonies" Maggie delivered along with her sisters Terre and Suzzy.

Maggie wrote most of the songs, with Terre contributing to a few. The sisters got a break when Paul Simon brought them in as backup singers on his 1973 album There Goes Rhymin' Simon. They got his assistance (along with an appearance by the Oak Ridge Boys) on their only album as a duo, Seductive Reasoning (1975).