Second death on Jefferson Airplane

Anderson was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest, and she became a singer in the original formation of Jefferson Airplane when she moved to San Francisco in the mid-’60s.

Signe was 74-years-old and had been suffering from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

The surviving members of the band took to social media to pay tribute to the singer.

“One sweet Lady has passed on”, Balin wrote of Anderson. “Let’s start a band” and no sooner then said Spencer was there joining in!”, Marty Balin wrote on Facebook, referring to the band’s late drummer Spencer Dryden.

Signe Anderson, one of the original vocalists for Jefferson Airplane, died Thursday (Jan. 28).

By the summer of 1966, however, she was pregnant with her first child and chose to leave as she believed life on the road wasn’t feasible with a newborn. Slick brought with her two future standards, “Somebody to Love” and “White Rabbit”, and a fierce vocal style and confrontational attitude that departed notably from Anderson’s. Her final performance with Jefferson Airplane came on October 15; Grace Slick joined the next night. She was the first person recruited by Balin and Kantner for the folk-rock group they were forming.

“I don’t regret having left”, she added.

Anderson was married twice, to Merry Prankster Jerry Anderson and to Michael Alois Ettlin, who died in 2011.

“Signe was one of the strongest people I have ever met”, guitarist Jorma Kaukonen wrote on his Cracks in the Finish blog. Flights of angels sing thee to thy rest sister … And bassist Jack Casady did too: I was just informed of the passing of Signe Anderson, the same day as we lost Paul. Katz, who arranged for the Airplane to sign with RCA Records and booked the band’s live appearances, had signed each musician in Jefferson Airplane to individual managerial contracts later deemed by the courts-after an epic, precedent-setting 22 years of litigation-to be grossly unfair to the band members. Listen to how she made the three part harmonies of JA Takes Off (first album) sound so thick…her wonderful tone between Paul’s and Marty’s.