Chuck Negron of Three Dog Night dies at 83

Chuck Negron, 1 of 3 pb singers successful the archetypal lineup of the hit-making Los Angeles set Three Dog Night, died Monday astatine his location successful Studio City. He was 83.

His decease was announced by a representative, Zach Farnum, who didn’t specify a origin but said that Negron died peacefully surrounded by his family. For decades, helium suffered from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

Founded successful 1967 by Negron and chap vocalists Cory Wells and Danny Hutton, Three Dog Night played catchy, polished brushed stone — “slick arsenic Wesson oil,” Robert Christgau erstwhile wrote — with lush three-part harmonies and tons of melodic hooks. The musicians wrote immoderate of their songs but were amended known for interpreting tunes by different songwriters, including Harry Nilsson (“One”), Laura Nyro (“Eli’s Coming”), Randy Newman (“Mama Told Me Not to Come”), Hoyt Axton (“Joy to the World”) and Paul Williams (“An Old Fashioned Love Song”). Negron sang pb connected “One” and “Joy to the World,” among different tunes.

Between 1969 and 1975, Three Dog Night enactment 21 songs wrong the Top 40 of Billboard’s Hot 100; 3 of those went to No. 1: “Mama Told Me Not to Come” — astir a sheltered young feline having his caput blown astatine a Hollywood enactment — “Joy to the World” and “Black & White,” the past written by David I. Arkin and Earl Robinson.

Tastemakers were divided connected the group, whose sanction was said to notation to the signifier among Indigenous Australians of sleeping with dogs for warmth. Robert Hilburn, The Times’ erstwhile popular euphony critic, called Three Dog Night “a reasonably pedestrian deed machine.” But a reviewer from the New York Times was warmer, penning successful 1975 that the set is “succeeding successful recreating the days erstwhile stone and rotation was amusive music, earlier relevance and heaviness descended connected it all.”

Negron was calved June 8, 1942 and grew up successful the Bronx. His father, Charles Negron, was a nightclub performer from Puerto Rico; Chuck Negron sang successful doo-wop groups arsenic a kid and aboriginal moved to L.A. to play hoops astatine California State University. Three Dog Night released its archetypal medium successful 1968 — among the different members were Michael Allsup, Jimmy Greenspoon, Joe Schermie and Floyd Sneed — but by the mid-’70s the set had breached up. Various reunions followed.

Negron was unfastened astir his struggles with cause addiction; according to Farnum’s statement, helium lived for a play connected L.A.’s Skid Row earlier getting cleanable successful 1991. Negron launched a solo vocation a fewer years later; his astir caller solo album, a collaboration with 2 of his daughters, came retired successful 2017.

Farnum said that Negron and Hutton reconciled past twelvemonth aft decades of estrangement. Negron’s survivors see his wife, Ami Albea Negron; his children Shaunti Negron Levick, Berry Oakley, Charles Negron III, Charlotte Negron and Annabelle Negron; and 9 grandchildren.