Andrew Robert Chapin (February 7, 1952 – December 31, 1985) was an American

keyboardist A keyboardist or keyboard player is a musician who plays keyboard instruments. Until the early 1960s musicians who played keyboards were generally classified as either pianists or organists. Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical instru ...

best known for his short stint with the Ricky Nelson Band, which ended in 1985 when Nelson and his bandmates died after Nelson's personal

DC-3 The Douglas DC-3 is a propeller-driven airliner manufactured by the Douglas Aircraft Company, which had a lasting effect on the airline industry in the 1930s to 1940s and World War II. It was developed as a larger, improved 14-bed sleeper ...

aircraft crashed on

New Year's Eve In the Gregorian calendar, New Year's Eve refers to the evening, or commonly the entire day, of the last day of the year, 31 December, also known as Old Year's Day. In many countries, New Year's Eve is celebrated with dancing, eating, drinkin ...

De Kalb, Texas De Kalb ( ) is a city in Bowie County, Texas, United States; it is part of the Texarkana metropolitan statistical area. Its two area codes are 430 and 903. Its ZIP code is 75559. It is in the Central Time Zone, and its population was 1,527 at t ...

while en route to a performance in

Dallas, Texas Dallas () is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the most populous city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of Texas metropolitan areas, most populous metropolitan area in Texas and the Metropolitan statistical area, fourth-most ...

. Prior to joining Ricky Nelson, Chapin had been a member of

The Association The Association is an American sunshine pop band from Los Angeles, California. During the late 1960s, the band had numerous hits at or near the top of the Billboard charts, ''Billboard'' charts (including "Windy (The Association song), Windy" ...

and before that of Steppenwolf, with whom he had recorded ''

Hour of the Wolf ''Hour of the Wolf'' () is a 1968 Swedish psychological horror and Folk horror film directed by Ingmar Bergman and starring Max von Sydow and Liv Ullmann. The story explores the disappearance of fictional painter Johan Borg (von Sydow), who ...

'' in 1975, the band's first album recorded without founding keyboardist

Goldy McJohn John Raymond Goadsby (May 2, 1945 – August 1, 2017), known as Goldy McJohn, was a Canadian keyboard player best known as the original keyboardist for rock group Steppenwolf. Originally a classically trained pianist, he was a pioneer in the ...

. The official explanation for Chapin's departure from Steppenwolf was that he disliked touring; he was subsequently replaced by Wayne Cook.

References

1951 births 1985 deaths Musicians from Chicopee, Massachusetts Accidental deaths in Texas Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in 1985 Victims of aviation accidents or incidents in the United States Steppenwolf (band) members 20th-century American keyboardists The Association members Musicians killed in aviation accidents or incidents {{US-keyboardist-stub

See also

References