Chords for The Life and Death of Donny Hathaway

[Fm] _ _ _ _ You know, I don't have any set hobbies like I'm getting into exercising, you know, I'm trying to keep [A#] myself fit
You know for the next 80 years, I hope _
_ _ I want to grasp more of a New York concept of [G] life
Because I feel if you can make it in the [C] capital of the world you can make it anywhere in the _ world _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [E] _ _ _ _ _ [F#] _
By
[C#] _ _ 1978 [F#] was disco burning at [B] the R&B charts [C] many of Donny [C#] Hathaway's
[Bm] Contemporaries had evolved to define the new dance sound of the era
But Donny himself had [F#] spent five years in obscurity for any mental illness
[B] [D] hungry for a comeback _
_ _ _ [F#] While _ he had a period of
[F#m] _ [B] being dormant for a moment musically
[F#m] _ _ [G] he was working on [F#] his stuff [Bm]
and he was reuniting with [G] Roberta Flack and
What I remember most is that they just [C#m] did some of the best [A] love songs of all time
_ _ [Em] They were [F#m] about to [E] do another [C#m] it was one song and it appeared on Roberta Flack's record blue lights in the basement
It was a [F#] massive [D] hit
It didn't take [G] too long for me and for the DJs in the [A] country
[D] for the audience to
_ Understand that that song [E] was the gem in that album [Bm] the [Em] closer I get to you.
Shout up [F#m] to number two
_ [E] Donny Hathaway was back
It's right [Bm] I'm just [B] never went away, you know, I mean, uh, it may have been of
[A] _ [G#m] _
_ Variations in his [E] levels of success.
He's not like the public acceptance.
It's important.
That's [D] not what your ability is based on
_ _ _ Now back in the [Bm] spotlight Donny returned to the studio immediately to record an [G] entire record of duets with Flack [D]
[Bm] in
January of 1979
_ Donny traveled to New York to record vocals for the [G] new songs
Which included [Em] you are my heaven co-written [C] by Stevie Wonder and Eric Mercury
_ [A] It was to [D] be
_ _ _ [Em] An entire album of duets, which I thought was [D] fabulous
[C]
Stevie and I [F#m] wrote that [Em] you are [D] my heaven, which was
[Bm] Funnily enough just the last song he recorded
[F#m] _
Donnie's [Dm] illness [Am] robbed him of many things but not his voice
When he sang I like to say he had this stained-glass
Voice there was God inside him and it was outside him.
He could hear it _ and
he [D] wasn't _ _ [G] I
Never [C] believed that he was in control
Now [Bm] it's good that the recording [B] session came off as well as it did _
_ But there [G] again, I say _ _
[D] _ You know, he shouldn't have been working period
_ The _ _ _ _ _ _ vocals were solid but Donny's mental [G] state was more fragile than [D] anyone knew Donny had been ill
_ This particular night.
He was singing.
He's sounding good
But at some point in the session he screamed and ran out of the room.
He was like huddled in a corner crying
_ And I said Donny I said brother what was what's up?
[G] They said I'm too many.
They're trying to [D] kill me
I said who you say white people?
He said they had my brain hooked up to a machine and you're stealing my music in my sound
_ He wasn't being himself _ _ _ _
Sold his heart [G] so, um, _ I
Called the session off the musicians [Gm] left the studio for Donnie.
It was the last time
[F] The _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ phone was ringing.
[A#] I answered the phone and it was Roberta
_ _ _ [G] _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Which was on _ _ _ so many levels so shocking and so
_ [Cm] _
_ [G] Upsetting [C] talk about the landscape _ _ [F] of _ _ your whole life
_ _ Changing Donny Hathaway was [B] found dead early that morning outside the Essex House Hotel having jumped from his window _
[F#] It was 34 years old _ _ _
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[E] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[F#m] _ _ _ _ _ [D#] _ _ _
_ I
Was a Saturday night
[Bm] late Sunday morning, [D] _ I
Got word. _
_ [Bm] I
_ Think the [E] kids were sleeping.
I didn't wake them up right then
_ _ _ [Bm] _
And I tried [B] to put it in a _
scenario where they would not be
_ [F#m] you _ know shocked or or _
[F#] Dismayed I believe
_ _ Up into that time You know
_ [Bm] That Donnie had toyed with suicide
[C#] But had never able to muster up [A] the nerve to really do it
And this [C#m] time I believe what he did was he sat in the window
_ And he closed his eyes and leaned back
[F#m] _ _ _
_ [Bm] Police ruled the death a [F#m] suicide _
[B] _ shockwaves ran through the music community _ _
so [G#m] hard to do
_ [A] _
That was like
_ [C] _ [B] Surrealistic I couldn't believe it.
You know, and I [C#] don't know how you did it, you know, but it was _
Something that's pain really [C] just still still my heart.
Hello
[F#m] _ [Bm] It was such a shock the [Em] music industry _ stopped
[Bm] For a minute.
I was in a recording studio four blocks _
from the [C#] Essex
_ _ Nobody _ [C#m] could nobody could play _
[D] It broke my heart, you know what I [G] heard that that just was so [D] awful
_ [B] So awful and then you [Bm] know, you had people speculating that he did this he did that to do to do to do
I don't think no one anyone knows for sure how it happened
_ When they first told me I didn't think he [D#] committed suicide.
I just didn't think it was a suicide [D#m] thing.
Maybe it was an accident.
[G#] Maybe _ [F#] he
Fell out [C#] of the [G] window.
He would open up the window and [C#m] stick his head out _ _ _
[F#m] Vocalized [B] I would just like to think that [F#m] he just _ fell
_ [Dm] Over _ _ _
_ _ [Am] _ _ _ _ _ _
[Gm] _ _ _ [Cm] _ [B] the years various rumors [Bm] have circulated that [Dm] Donnie [G] fell _ _
[Am] From the window [G] that a man with so much talent at the peak of his success would take his own life is difficult to accept
_ However, the sad truth [C] is that the leading cause [G] of death among those who suffer from paranoid schizophrenia
_ is [A#] suicide _ _ [D] I _ _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Fm] somewhat focus so much on _
How he died it didn't matter as much as what he had done in his life
_ How long his music will live beyond beyond his life?
[D#] _ _ _