UPDATE June 6: According to Andrew’s sister, he died in his sleep in his Encino, Ca. home. He was undergoing cancer treatment recently, but according to his family, he was responding well to the treatment.
UPDATE June 5: Gold’s passing has also been confirmed on his mother’s website. Click here to be taken to her site.
Way too young, Andrew Gold passed away on June 3rd, 2011 from an apparent heart attack. He was born on August 2, 1951, and became a huge singer/songwriter, mainly in the 1970’s.
He was best known for his hits, the 1977 Lonely Boy, and the 1978 Thank you for Being a Friend (used as the theme song on Golden Girls.)
He had the distinction of being the first human voice to be ‘heard’ on the surface of Mars: his rendition of the theme from the television series Mad About You, entitled “Final Frontier,” was used as the wake-up call for the Mars Pathfinder space probe in 1996.
Another part of my youth gone. I remember making up “dances” in my living room with my friends to his songs. We will truly miss him. He is survived by his wife Leslie Kogan, his three daughters from a previous marriage, his sisters Martha and Melani, and his mother, singer-actress Marni Nixon.