BARBARA ORBISON DIES...

BARBARA ORBISON DIES
Barbara Orbison, widow of Roy Orbison and a music industry player in her own right, has died aged 60 after losing her battle with pancreatic cancer.

German-born Orbison met future husband Roy at one of his gigs in the UK when she was seventeen and he was 32. They married in the US just nine months later. Barbara entered her husband's life at the end of a period of tragedy for the singer songwriter, who had lost his first wife to a motorcycle crash, and then two of his children in a house fire.

Barbara was widely renowned for firstly helping her husband to get his life back on track, and then for helping him restore his musical career, ensuring he enjoyed a creative renaissance in the last decade of his life, both as a solo artist and as part of the supergroup the Traveling Wilburys.

Roy Orbison died prematurely in late 1988, aged 52, after suffering a heart attack. Having managed the latter part of her husband's career, Barbera continued to protect and promote her husband's legacy after his death, including co-producing a four CD box set of all of his recordings released in 2008.

She also established her own music publishing company in Nashville called Still Working Music, through which she worked with a number of songwriters, including Taylor Swift, Billy Burnette and Tommy Lee James.

Aside from her music work, she also led a number of charitable projects, including a 1991 tribute show to her late husband that raised over a million to help the homeless in LA.

She is survived by two sons Roy Kelton Jr and Alexander, and her stepson from Roy's first marriage, Wesley.

Source: http://www.unlimitedmedia.co.uk/