This morning I lost one of my dearest friends and most important musical role models, and the world lost one of its best composers. Bill Duckworth was diagnosed with pancreas cancer a year ago last February. He got into a state-of-the-art therapy program, and had the disease in remission, and for quite a few months it looked like he was going to beat one of the fastest and most lethal cancers there is (and the same one that killed Morton Feldman). But he finally started having bad reactions to the chemo, and it wore him down. I had heard about a week ago that he had decided to go off chemo, and he went fast after that, slipping away about midnight last night, according to his wife Nora, who called this morning.
to read more: http://www.artsjournal.com/postclassic/2012/09/strange-times-william-duckworth-1943-2012.html#respond