“If you’re honest and play with love, people will sit down and listen… my music is the sum of all I have experienced.” – Chuck Mangione
By Doug Draper
Posted July 28th, 2025 on Niagara At Large
Chuck Mangione, the man and his horn as many will remember him
The last couple of months have struck a few too many sad notes for music lovers around the world.
In June, there was the passing of Sly Stone of Sly & The Family Stone fame and of the iconic Brian Wilson who came to fame with The Beach Boys.
More recently we learned of the passing of world renown English jazz singer Cleo Laine and of English rocker of Black Sabbath and all-round agent of humor and chaos Ozzy Osbourne.
Ozzy’s death on July 22nd generated so much news that it almost completely overshadowed the death, at age 84, of American jazz musician and composer Chuck Mangione on the same day.
Born not too far from Niagara in Rochester, N.Y., trumpeter and flugelhornist Chuck Mangione played with a number of big-name jazz artists before making a name of his own in the 1970s and 1980s for striking out with his own group of musicians with a number of popular songs he composed like ‘Chase The Clouds Away’, ‘Hill Where The Lord Hides’ and ‘Land Of Make Believe’.
These songs and others crossed the line into jazz pop or jazz fusion and did not necessarily hit the spot with jazz purists, but they were very well received at Mangione’s concerts, many of which he performed on the Canadian side of the border.
Perhaps his most popular song, released in 1978, is ‘Feels’ So Good’, that peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard charts in North America, which is quite an achievement for any song that is an instrumental and has at least a touch of jazz mixed in with pop and R&B.
To hear and watch Chuck Mangione perform ‘Feel So Good’, click on the screen immediately below –
R.I.P. Chuck Magione, 1940 to 2025
For a related story, click on – Remembering Chuck Mangione: A Jazz Icon Who Made ‘Feels So Good’ a Feeling, Not Just a Song – American Blues Scene
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