Tributes to Christine

[Street_Dreamer]

Another great tribute: https://youtu.be/Koi5ntcid_M

[jbrownsjr]

Originally Posted by Street_Dreamer

Another great tribute: https://youtu.be/Koi5ntcid_M

Fantastic!

[The Catdancer]

From Todd Sharp:

Around 1970, Cleveland, Ohio
Dreams
I’m 14, working at Record Revolution on Coventry Road. Off days I’m at Bill deArango’s Guitar Studio which was a well of guitar enthusiasm and musical activity.
I’m playing in various bands and spending a lot of time with guitar in hand and headphones on – copping records. Fleetwood Mac is definitely in my mix from their first album “Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac” and onward through their second or third evolution including Christine McVie. Bare Trees got a lot of play at my house– “Spare Me A Little of Your Love” and “Homeward Bound” both got me. That voice and phrasing – Christine McVie from Chicken Shack. I also had her first Christine Perfect solo record. That honey coated voice. She got me. Those were days of woodshedding, figuring out how to work a guitar and dreaming of getting out of the land of Cleves and onto the bigger stages.
1978 – after two years with Daryl Hall & John Oates I’ve landed in LA and snagged an audition with Bob Welch from Fleetwood Mac. Bob had just released his first solo album - French Kiss. I walked into a rehearsal room at S.I.R. and found Bob with a bass around his neck and Mick Fleetwood sitting behind a drum kit. It was a moment. Here were two musicians that I had been admiring for a long time. It clicked. We got on like we had known each other for years. Mick was managing Bob and helping him get his band together and they hired me on the spot. Dreams.
It seemed that we (Bob) opened every US Fleetwood Mac show over the next few years and I got sort of adopted into the FM family at that point. There was an invitation from Mick to join him in Ghana, Africa to record his first solo record which I will someday write a book about. Somewhere in there I worked with another FM family artist - Danny Douma, and that is when I first really got to know Christine McVie. We spent a few nights together with Danny and his producer Nick Van Marth, at Village Recorders overdubbing on Danny’s “Night Eyes” record. Fleetwood Mac was recording “Tusk” in the next room.
Christine was from my perspective - a very comfortable rock star. She was fun, easy to know and she would often ring Angela and I to come over and have dinner and hang out. We became good friends. Even best friends for a while. I spent the next few years bouncing around LA trying to get a band going, writing songs, recording demos and doing any sessions I could get. One night I played Chris a demo I had just recorded. She loved the song and volunteered to come to the studio and sing background vocals on it. Dreams.
Not long after that, Christine asked if I would be interested to help her get a band together and to help her write songs for a solo record she was going to record during a Mac hiatus. So in about 1983 she picked me up, dusted me off and said come on, we’re going to write a batch of songs and put a band together and record an album in Europe with producer Russ Titleman. And don’t you know I have nearly every record Russ Titleman and Lenny Waronker have produced in my collection. I think I said – “pinch me” am I dreaming? Did Christine McVie just invite me to help her write an album and flush out a band to record it? Dreams..
We spent a few months writing, recruited George Hawkins and Stephen Ferrone to the band and then travelled to Montreux Switzerland to record the album. Lindsey Buckingham popped in and added his brilliance to a few of the tracks. Stephen Bruton joined us on guitar for the follow up tour and Billy Burnette lent a hand as well. These people have been my lifelong friends.
I introduced Chris to her husband Eddy Quintella who I had become friends with at Montreux. She took me to England with her where we worked with Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton and Ray Cooper - at the legendary Olympic Studios in London. James Taylor stopped in for an afternoon and we just hung out. Dreams…
The album – Christine McVie came out in 1984 and produced the Hot 100 top 10 hit “Got A Hold on Me” and top 40 “Love Will Show Us How”. We wrote both songs together.
Christine McVie. You left this place better than you found it for sure. Your music and voice will live on forever. I will never forget the opportunity you offered me and the confidence you instilled in me. I will never forget your beautiful soul, your grace, friendship and generosity. I wish I could have had the chance to tell you that one more time. Perhaps I will one day when we get together to write more songs and laugh again. Today I am heart broken.
Love always your friend,
Todd

[jbrownsjr]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/...133057901.html

[dougl]

https://youtu.be/OrMxQrNxXfY

[hs421139]

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/...hristine-mcvie




Christine McVie Famous memorial
ORIGINAL NAME
Christine Anne Perfect
BIRTH
12 Jul 1943
Bouth, South Lakeland District, Cumbria, England
DEATH
30 Nov 2022 (aged 79)
London, City of London, Greater London, England
BURIAL
Cremated
MEMORIAL ID
246073826

[jbrownsjr]

Originally Posted by hs421139

https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/...hristine-mcvie




Christine McVie Famous memorial
ORIGINAL NAME
Christine Anne Perfect
BIRTH
12 Jul 1943
Bouth, South Lakeland District, Cumbria, England
DEATH
30 Nov 2022 (aged 79)
London, City of London, Greater London, England
BURIAL
Cremated
MEMORIAL ID
246073826

Gosh, even that made me have tears.

[HomerMcvie]

It still seems like a bad dream...

I wonder why it says burial and cremated?

[aleuzzi]

There's an adorable story about Christine and John at Cleveland.com which I was able to read on my phone this morning but is now blocked by a pay wall.

https://www.google.com/search?q=chri...hrome&ie=UTF-8


The gist of the story is, a radio station in Cleveland wanted to have a marketing angle that would tied them to the band in 1977 when RUMOURS was really hot. An employee learned John loved penguins, so she used her connections with the Cleveland zoo to broker a deal with the band to purchase two penguins, one to be called Peter (after Peter Green). Then, the radio station would ask the Cleveland community for donations to support the purchase. Anyway, the band loved the idea, and Christine and John attended the ceremony. There's a cute picture of John holding a Rockhopper while Christine delicately touches it.

The radio station staff remembers Christine being one of the most lovely, down-to-earth people, so unlike any rock star they had met. She was kind, funny, and warm.

Hope someone is able to access the article and copy it here.

[Penguin Emeritus]

Originally Posted by aleuzzi

There's an adorable story about Christine and John at Cleveland.com which I was able to read on my phone this morning but is now blocked by a pay wall.

https://www.google.com/search?q=chri...hrome&ie=UTF-8


The gist of the story is, a radio station in Cleveland wanted to have a marketing angle that would tied them to the band in 1977 when RUMOURS was really hot. An employee learned John loved penguins, so she used her connections with the Cleveland zoo to broker a deal with the band to purchase two penguins, one to be called Peter (after Peter Green). Then, the radio station would ask the Cleveland community for donations to support the purchase. Anyway, the band loved the idea, and Christine and John attended the ceremony. There's a cute picture of John holding a Rockhopper while Christine delicately touches it.

The radio station staff remembers Christine being one of the most lovely, down-to-earth people, so unlike any rock star they had met. She was kind, funny, and warm.

Hope someone is able to access the article and copy it here.

I love that story and that picture. I've actually had that photo as my lockscreen picture for the last 3 months, it's so sweet. always makes me happy to look at it.

--Lis

[Penguin Emeritus]

Originally Posted by HomerMcvie

It still seems like a bad dream...

I wonder why it says burial and cremated?

I guess Burial is just the title for that section. I suppose family makes decision on what to do with cremated remains. Some folks bury them. Others keep at home or scatter where the deceased has requested.

A friend in the UK told me cremation is quite popular there these days.

ugh it all still makes me so sad.

--Lis

[jmn3]

Remembering when Christine McVie & Fleetwood Mac gave a penguin to the Cleveland zoo

By John Benson, special to cleveland.com

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Christine McVie, who passed away recently at age 79 after a short illness, was known as Fleetwood Mac’s “Songbird” in honor of her 1977 “Rumours”-era hit. But around Cleveland, she’s also remembered for her part in a tale involving another sort of bird.

Former WMMS-FM/100.7 program director John Gorman recounted the tale recently, shortly after learning of McVie’s passing. It goes back 45 years to the time that the Buzzard helped the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame band donate penguins to the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo.

The marketing promotion took place in 1977 when Fleetwood Mac was arguably the world’s biggest rock ‘n’ roll group, a superstar act at the height of its multiplatinum “Rumours” success.

“When ‘Rumours’ came out, we said this is going to be the biggest album of the year,” Gorman said. “There was no doubt in our mind. It was an adult-themed album, musically diverse.

“I remember being told by the Warner Bros. person that they actually alone sold a million copies of ‘Rumours’ in the Greater Cleveland market. It was like, we have to get behind this band, get to know this band and do everything we can with the band. That was one of our goals.”

With Fleetwood Mac booked for two sold-out 1977 September dates at the old Richfield Coliseum, Gorman looked for an edge to put the Buzzard over competitors WGCL and M105.

He asked for ideas from WMMS personnel. That’s when Public Service Director Rhonda Kiefer had an interesting thought.

“It was Rhonda who said, ‘They have a penguin as a logo. We have a buzzard as a logo. What if the Buzzard donated a penguin to the Cleveland Zoo?’” Gorman said.

“I told Rhonda, ‘OK, figure it out and we’ll do it.’ That’s how it came about.”

Kiefer added, “I remember sitting in my office, wracking my brain about what can we do that would be big, that would get Fleetwood Mac’s attention and would be good for the community.

“We knew (Fleetwood Mac bassist) John McVie had a thing for penguins. Honestly, when I got the idea, I didn’t expect it to happen. I thought this was kind of crazy. It was just like a miracle that it all worked out.”

It’s one thing to think up a promotional campaign and another to pull it off. Luckily for Kiefer, she had various ties to the Northeast Ohio nonprofit community, which included the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo.

“When we broached the idea with the zoo, they were like, ‘Let’s do this’ and they pursued it,” Kiefer said.

“They were able to get a pair of penguins and John worked through Warner Bros. Records. We kind of pulled it all together.”

Gorman said at the time a penguin was about $800 (roughly $4,000 in 2022 dollars).


In town for the Richfield Coliseum dates, both John McVie and his then-wife, Christine, visited the Cleveland Zoo.

The photo opportunity found the two rock stars presenting a check to the zoo for future Humboldt penguin donations (one of which, a male, would be named Peter after the band’s founder Peter Green).

The pair posed for cameras while holding a Rockhopper penguin named Rocky in the indoor refrigerated Bird Building room.

“I know John was so excited to hold the penguin and Christine was kind of squeamish,” Kiefer said. “John was the one who loved penguins and Christine didn’t want to hold it but she warmed up to the penguin after a few minutes.

“They were both tickled. I don’t think they had come that close to a penguin so it was a good experience for them as well.”

Gorman said the Buzzard milked the penguin donations for the better part of the next year leading up to the band’s iconic World Series of Rock performance in August 1978 at the old Cleveland Municipal Stadium.

“They absolutely loved it,” Gorman said. “That was something both Christine and John were saying nobody ever thought of before.

“For whatever reason, John McVie loves penguins. He told us he lived near the London Zoo and sometimes he would just go down and see the penguins, chill out and get his head together.”

Considering Fleetwood Mac followed up “Rumours” with “Tusk” a few years later, Kiefer confirmed the station didn’t consider donating an elephant to the zoo.

“No, we did not but I love elephants,” Kiefer said. “They’re probably my favorite.”

As for his memory of Christine McVie, Gorman said in a world of rock stars she was as down-to-earth as they come. She was the band’s keyboardist and one of its three singer-songwriters, writing and singing on many of its biggest hits, including “Songbird,” “Everywhere,” “You Make Loing Fun,” “Don’t Stop,” “Little Lies” and more.

“She was one of the most wonderful people I ever met in my life,” Gorman said. “I can’t say enough good things about her. You would never know she was a rock star.

“I think Christine was probably like the den mother of Fleetwood Mac. She, as much as anybody, kept that band together.”

[jbrownsjr]

Originally Posted by aleuzzi

There's an adorable story about Christine and John at Cleveland.com which I was able to read on my phone this morning but is now blocked by a pay wall.

https://www.google.com/search?q=chri...hrome&ie=UTF-8


The gist of the story is, a radio station in Cleveland wanted to have a marketing angle that would tied them to the band in 1977 when RUMOURS was really hot. An employee learned John loved penguins, so she used her connections with the Cleveland zoo to broker a deal with the band to purchase two penguins, one to be called Peter (after Peter Green). Then, the radio station would ask the Cleveland community for donations to support the purchase. Anyway, the band loved the idea, and Christine and John attended the ceremony. There's a cute picture of John holding a Rockhopper while Christine delicately touches it.

The radio station staff remembers Christine being one of the most lovely, down-to-earth people, so unlike any rock star they had met. She was kind, funny, and warm.

Hope someone is able to access the article and copy it here.

Wow! I love this story. Thank you for posting! I'm loving how everyone else that had contact with Christine realized she was the amazing human being from the band along with an amazing writer and musician.

[Penguin Emeritus]

"In town for the Richfield Coliseum dates, both John McVie and his then-wife, Christine, visited the Cleveland Zoo."

so...not to be a stickler..although they were still legally married, they were long separated by then. Not that you can tell by the vibe of that beautiful picture.

so basically mid divorce, they made this wonderful little visit/donation to the zoo. No wonder the zoo people/radio people thought they were still together.

He's wearing the big penguin ring that she gave him when she left.

How much do I adore them...xoxo

--Lis

[HomerMcvie]

That's an awesome story! Thanks for sharing it.