[Source: Entertainment Weekly]

Whitlock founded the pioneering band alongside Eric Clapton, recorded with George Harrison, and enjoyed a successful career as a solo musician.

Bobby Whitlock, who co-founded the pioneering rock band Derek and the Dominos alongside Eric Clapton and launched a successful solo career that involved participating in sessions for George Harrison, has died. He was 77.

Whitlock’s death on Sunday was confirmed by Clapton, who shared a photo of his old bandmate and lifelong friend on Facebook with the caption, “Our dear friend Bobby Whitlock, has passed away at 77, our sincere condolences to Bobby’s wife CoCo and his family on this sad day… RIP Bobby xxx.”

The musician’s manager, Carol Kaye, told Variety that Whitlock died at 1:20 a.m. on Sunday, after a brief battle with cancer.

Whitlock was born on March 18, 1948, in Memphis, the epicenter of blues and soul music, from which the rock and roll that Whitlock helped pioneer would spring.

He made history young, becoming the first white musician to be signed to the legendary Stax Records label, which helped break the careers of Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, Booker T. & the MG’s, and more.

“Everybody at Stax would come over to hear me play at the Cabaret Club at University,” Whitlock told The Los Angeles Beat in 2012. “Memphis was a great place to be at that point in time. Music was just everywhere. It was thick. There was always something going on. Great music was always being played or made by somebody. Arthur Conley or Wilson Pickett would be in town, and I always had my ear to the ground at what was happening at Stax.”

Whitlock would play locally alongside fellow Stax artists until meeting the collaborator who would change his life in 1969.

That year, Whitlock joined the touring band of Delaney & Bonnie, the musical project of husband and wife team Delaney and Bonnie Bramlett. Another member of that band was Eric Clapton, with whom he’d form the band Derek and the Dominos alongside bassist Carl Radle and drummer Jim Gordon — also members of the Delaney & Bonnie touring group.

Whitlock sang and played keyboards for the short-lived band that nevertheless produced a sterling classic, 1970’s Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs. Though the album’s signature single, “Layla,” is often credited solely to Clapton, the song originated with Derek and the Dominos. The album also produced the hits “Anyday,” “Bell Bottom Blues,” “Why Does Love Got to Be So Sad?” and “Tell the Truth,” all of which Whitlock co-wrote with Clapton.

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