Jim Croce (1943-1973)

January 10 is the birthday of Jim Croce (1943-1973), American singer-songwriter. Between 1966 and 1973, Croce released five studio albums and 11 singles. His singles "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown" and "Time in a Bottle" were both number one hits on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.

James Joseph Croce was born in South Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to James Albert and Flora Mary (Babucci) Croce, Italian Americans. At five, he learned to play his first song on the accordion, "Lady of Spain."

After graduating from Upper Darby High School in 1960, Croce studied at Malvern Preparatory School for a year, and then Villanova University. Croce majored in psychology, minored in German, and graduated in 1965 with a Bachelor degree. Croce was a member of the Villanova Singers and the Villanova Spires. When the Spires performed off-campus or made recordings, they were known as The Coventry Lads. Croce was also a student disc jockey at WKVU (now WXVU). The Coventry Lads were chosen for a foreign exchange tour, in which they performed in Africa, Middle East, and Yugoslavia.

Croce released his first album, Facets, in 1966, with 500 copies pressed. The album had been financed with a $500 wedding gift from Croce's parents, who hoped the album would fail and their son would return to college. However, the album proved a success, with every copy being sold.

From the mid-1960s to early 1970s, Croce performed in a duet with this future wife, Ingrid. His set list covered several genres, including blues, country, rock and roll, and folk.

Croce married Ingrid in 1966. He enlisted in the Army National Guard that same year to avoid being drafted and deployed to Vietnam.

In 1968, at the encouragement of record producer Tommy West, the Croces move to New York City. There the couple recorded their first album with Capitol Records, Jim & Ingrid Croce. During the next two years, they drove more than 300,000 miles, playing small clubs and concerts on the college concert circuit promoting their album.

Becoming disillusioned by the music business and New York City, they sold all but one guitar, to pay the rent, and returned to Pennsylvania, settling in an old farm in Lyndell. Croce got a job driving trucks and doing construction work, while continuing to write songs, often about the characters he would meet at the local bars and truck stops and his experiences at work. The couple returned to Philadelphia, where Croce eventually got a job at a Philadelphia R&B AM radio station.

In 1970, Croce met the classically trained pianist-guitarist and singer-songwriter Maury Muehleisen from Trenton, New Jersey. Salviuolo brought the Croce and Muehleisen duo together at the production office of Tommy West and Terry Cashman in New York City. Initially, Croce backed Muehleisen on guitar at his gigs but in time their roles reversed, with Muehleisen adding lead guitar to Croce's music.

In 1972, Croce signed to a three-record deal with ABC Records and released two albums, You Don't Mess Around with Jim and Life and Times. The singles "You Don't Mess Around with Jim", "Operator (That's Not the Way It Feels)", and "Time in a Bottle" (written for his then-unborn son, A. J. Croce) all received airplay. Croce's biggest single, "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown", hit No. 1 on the American charts in July 1973. That year, the Croces relocated to San Diego, California.

As his career picked up, Croce began touring the United States with Muehleisen, performing live, including in large coffee houses, on college campuses, and at folk festivals. However, Croce's financial situation was still dire. The record company had fronted him the money to record the album, and much of the money the album earned went back to pay the advance. In February 1973, Croce and Muehleisen traveled to Europe to promote the album, visiting London, Paris, and Amsterdam, and getting positive reviews. Croce also began appearing on television, including on Don Kirshner's Rock Concert and The Midnight Special, which he co-hosted. In July 1973, Croce and Muehleisen again visited London and performed on The Old Grey Whistle Test. Croce finished recording the album I Got a Name one week before his death. During his tours, Croce grew increasingly homesick, and decided to take a break from music and settle down with his wife and infant son after his Life and Times tour was completed. In a letter to his wife which arrived after his death, Croce stated his intention to quit music and stick to writing short stories and movie scripts as a career, and withdraw from public life.

On Thursday, September 20, 1973, during Croce's Life and Times tour and the day before his ABC single "I Got a Name" was released, Croce, Muehleisen, and four others were killed when the chartered Beechcraft E18S he was traveling in crashed while taking off from the Natchitoches Regional Airport in Natchitoches, Louisiana. Others who died in the crash were charter pilot Robert N. Elliott, comedian George Stevens, manager and booking agent Kenneth D. Cortose, and road manager Dennis Rast. Croce had just completed a concert at Northwestern State University's Prather Coliseum in Natchitoches and was flying to Sherman, Texas, for a concert at Austin College. The plane crashed an hour after the end of the concert. The NTSB later determined that the crash was caused by pilot error.

The album I Got a Name was released on December 1, 1973. The posthumous release included three hits: "Workin' at the Car Wash Blues", "I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song", and the title song, which had been used as the theme to the film The Last American Hero which was released two months prior to his death. The album reached No. 2 and "I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song" reached No. 9 on the singles chart.

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