"Late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel is mourning the death of one of his oldest friends his show's bandleader, Cleto Escobedo III. Kimmel announced Escobedo's death Tuesday on Instagram, saying that we are heartbroken is an understatement. Escobedo was 59. Escobedo and Kimmel met as children in Las Vegas, where they grew up across the street from each other. We just met one day on the street, and there were a few kids on the street,"
"In 2016, on Escobedo's 50th birthday, Kimmel dedicated a segment to his friend, recalling pranks with a BB gun or mooning people from the back of his mom's car. Cleto had a bicycle with a sidecar attached to it. We called it the side hack. I would get in the sidecar and then Cleto would drive me directly into garbage cans and bushes, Kimmel recalled."
"Escobedo would grow up to become a professional musician, specializing in the saxophone, and touring with Earth, Wind and Fire's Phillip Bailey and Paula Abdul. He recorded with Marc Anthony, Tom Scott and Take Six. When Kimmel got his own ABC late-night talk show in 2003, he lobbied for Escobedo to lead the house band on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Of course I wanted great musicians, but I wanted somebody I had chemistry with, Kimmel told WABC in 2015."
Cleto Escobedo III, 59, served as bandleader for Jimmy Kimmel Live! and was a childhood friend of Jimmy Kimmel from Las Vegas. Escobedo became a professional saxophonist who toured with Phillip Bailey and Paula Abdul and recorded with Marc Anthony, Tom Scott and Take Six. Kimmel lobbied for Escobedo to lead the show's house band when the ABC late-night program launched in 2003. Kimmel and Escobedo shared a longtime personal bond and on-air chemistry, and Kimmel publicly recalled shared childhood pranks during a 2016 tribute. The date and cause of death were not immediately known; a recent episode of the show was abruptly canceled.
Read at www.mercurynews.com
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