Chuck Negron, a founding member of Three Dog Night, passed away Monday, February 2, after battling multiple health issues.

Negron provided the unmistakable lead vocals on classics such as Joy to the World, One, An Old Fashioned Love Song, Easy to Be Hard, and The Show Must Go On, during the band’s peak in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

According to his publicist, Negron passed away at his home in Studio City, California, “surrounded by his loving family,” People reported.

“Negron was a testament to never giving up – persevering through everything life throws at you, everything you may throw at yourself, and striving on,” his publicist said in a statement.

The musician was born on June 8, 1942, and was raised in the Bronx by his father, Charles Negron, a Puerto Rican nightclub performer, and his mother, Elizabeth Rooke. Following his parents’ divorce, when Negron was just two, he grew up singing in doo-wop groups and playing basketball from an early age, eventually earning a basketball recruitment to California State University that brought him to Los Angeles, where he began working in the music industry.

At just 15, Negron, who eventually ended up powering a run of chart-topping hits that came to define rock and pop radio during the late ’60s and early ’70s, recorded his debut single and took the stage at the iconic Apollo Theater with his vocal group, The Rondells.

Speaking to the Rapid City Journal in 2004, recalled that night, saying, “We were not just only the white group in the building. But by our second verse, something magical happened. The audience started to cheer us on.”

While in LA, where he attended California State University on a basketball scholarship, Negron teamed up with Danny Hutton and the late Cory Wells to form Three Dog Night in 1967.

Despite massive success, the band collapsed amid internal conflicts and drug use. Negron later reconciled with Hutton after decades of estrangement, and after overcoming addiction, rebuilt his life and career as a solo artist.

In his memoir, Three Dog Nightmare, Negron shared his harrowing journey, writing of the times he rose to fame, his addictions, his near death-experiences, and how he managed to recover.

Negron had been living with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) for decades, but that didn’t prevent him from touring. He only stopped amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Chuck Negron was married four times, including to Paula Louise Ann Goetten, Julia Densmore, Robin Silna, and later his manager, Ami Albea, whom he wed in a socially distanced ceremony in 2020. He was the father of five children, including daughters Shaunti, Charlie, and Annabelle Negron, as well as son Chuckie Negron and stepson Berry Oakley Jr.

According to his publicist, the cause of death was complications from COPD and heart failure.

“Through his six decades of success, and all the ups-and-downs, his large, unconventional family was most important to him,” his publicist said.

Rest in peace, Chuck Negron.

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