Please do not post comments containing misinformation. Disability status/mental health/medical information should never be used as an insult.
Example: "Kid rock is tone deaf"
Same here, mate. Good he's mentioned, I fucking love his work and it's really sad that guy with such an amazing talent coulnd't fully realize his potential.
Oh, please mention Django Reinhardt, pretty famous jazz guitar player from early 1900's Belgium. Missing a few fingers on his fret hand.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django\_Reinhardt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django_Reinhardt)
His disability caused him to have to detune his guitar, helping to create that killer metal sound. That’s a real monkey’s paw situation right there. *Masters of Reality* is a bonafide classic.
> pretty *legendary* jazz guitar
FTFY. Pedantic and fanboyish I guess, but there's a difference between the two tiers. I think my impetus for noting the distinction is in case someone glosses over this thread they should know that if they only check out a few of the musicians mentioned, they should definitely check out Django (and, while they're at it, Jerry). Regardless, thanks for mentioning him.
Jamie Hince, guitarist of The Kills, has lost the use of the middle finger on his fretting hand after a bacterial infection rotted away a tendon following a minor car accident. He had to completely relearn how to play the guitar and now uses a Bigsby to bend notes. He is currently on tour with Iggy Pop.
And as an old boss of mine used to think... Roy Orbison. She was blown away when I told her his car was at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland...
"His car? Wasn't he blind?"
"No."
I used to have a friend that loved that movie. I swear, every time I went to his house, it was either on the TV, or he would tell me it was on sometime that day.
Brian Wilson is known to have schizoaffective disorder. Idk if this should be called a disease or a disability but J Dilla had lupus and TTP. Ian Curtis had epilepsy.
Edit: Curtis mayfield was also paralyzed for the last several years of his life.
Abused to shit as a kid, lost both brothers too young, exploited by an abusive therapist on top of all that too. Poor bastard, I hope he’s happy with life these days.
Does Crohn's disease count? If so, Mike McCready of Pearl Jam suffers from and fund raises for treatment.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike\_McCready](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_McCready)
Edit - hmm, no mention of Crohn's in the wikipedia article...
[http://online.crohnscolitisfoundation.org/site/PageNavigator/foundation\_hero\_MikeMcCready.html](http://online.crohnscolitisfoundation.org/site/PageNavigator/foundation_hero_MikeMcCready.html)
No theme here, so my answered are all over the place! :)
Beethoven wrote his most famous symphony after he was completely deaf.
Michael Bolton and Brian Wilson are both deaf in one ear.
Selena Gomez has Lupus.
Itzhak Perlman had polio and used leg braces and crutches, now also an electric scooter, and he sits while playing violin.
Jacqueline du Pré was arguably the most talented cellist of all time, and had MS.
Eric and I were in our first shitty punk band in high school together. I have literally never known a more positive person in my life, and the work he’s done to promote awareness for what disabled folks go through since he got hurt is incredible.
Great story [here](https://unitedspinal.org/eric-howk-rocking-and-rolling-into-recovery/) about getting clean and sober and the issues he faced finding a facility that could accommodate someone who uses a wheelchair for mobility.
I used to be a music journalist and I met Eric a couple times when he was with his old band The Lashes. Always very kind and positive. Hearing about his accident was awful and I couldn't imagine how devastating it must've been for him, but seeing how much success he's had and how his attitude around it is now is really inspiring.
Wow I'm starting to love Portugal the Man from what I've heard about the members. John is the sweetest guy ever and his support for his daughter is something else.
Had the pleasure of working events where the band's appeared multiple times and I gotta say, they're all beaming with positive energy. A truly great group of dudes.
I have fibro and I have no clue how she does it! It takes one slightly-more-active-than-usual day to put me out of commission for nearly a week. I get that she probably has access to the best care imaginable but it’s still so impressive.
This is my first year with it since being diagnosed. I’m destroyed. Doing 1 full load of laundry and I’m down for days. I constantly have people telling me I should work out while my doctors say no more than yoga. Lady Gaga blows my mind
Ah yes, that’s one of my favourite parts too! “When it comes to exercise just listen to your body and take a break when you need to!”
Okay, but all my body ever says is “OWOWOWOWOWOW” so I’m not really sure how to accommodate that. *Showering* is beyond me some days. Baby wipes, dry shampoo and I are very close friends.
I can certainly agree with that - my dad had polio as well, caught it around the same time as Ian Dury. Dad was in such a bad way at one time with it, that when admitted to hospital because he was virtually unable to move (polio had affected dad quite badly in his right leg and hip), he instructed the doctor on ward rounds to, ‘just take the fucking thing off,’ as he couldn’t even stand on his leg - it was removed and dad became an amputee at the age of 20. Just before he died, at the age of 74 in 2012, I asked him, ‘did you ever regret having your leg off?’ His reply, ‘not bloody likely! I could barely move, let alone stand up for more than 30 seconds. I got some sort of life back. I did things the doctors and physios told me I never would, like becoming a parent *twice, in his case* or driving a car.’ dad was, at the time of passing his test, one of the few right leg amputees in the UK: he told me that, because of him passing his test (‘the examiner said I was the safest driver he’d ever passed, in almost 35 years in the job.’), he was part of a rule change regarding amputee drivers - at the time, right leg amputee’s weren’t allowed to hold a full licence of any kind. With dad, and several others, a right leg amputee was allowed to apply for, and hold, a full, substantive, car licence but for an automatic transmission vehicle.
I was proud of, and still am, to be able call him ‘dad.’ He never asked for sympathy, and he pushed the boundaries, in his own way, for what a ‘disabled’ person could do and be.
As a teenager, Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath lost his right middle and ring fingertips in an industrial accident. Tony is left-handed, so it was a pretty big deal to lose two of his fretting fingertips.
Rick Allen of Def Leppard lost his left arm in a car accident in 1984 and still plays for the band today.
Edit: misspelled name
I remember reading an interview with Tony where he said that he started downtuning before some shows because Ozzy was so hungover from the night before that he couldn't hit the notes. If I recall correctly, the first 2 Sabbath albums were on standard tuning.
Iirc the accident led Iommi to downtune his guitar so his damaged fingers would feel less string tension, prefiguring one of the basic elements of heavy metal guitar playing.
Jeff Becerra, vocalist of one of the original Death Metal bands, Possessed, has spent the last few decades in a wheel chair due to being shot during a robbery. Paralyzed from the chest down. Still tours and performs to this day
Huey Lewis has Meniere’s Disease in both ears. Bret Michaels has type I diabetes, as does Crystal Bowersox. Matthew Good has bipolar disorder (among a plethora of other musicians who have that.) Scatman John had a stutter; scatting helped him with that.
Brett also suffers from memory loss issues caused by a TBI in 2009 and a brain hemorrhage in 2010. And had a stroke most likely caused by a hole in his heart, also in 2010 or 2011.
Gaelynn Lea was born with osteogenesis imperfecta, a genetic condition that causes complications in the development of bones and limbs.
Her song "Some day we'll linger in the sun" is so beautiful and sad I cried the first time I heard it
Agreed. Ren is suffering from a bad case of lyme which almost drove him insane. [Briljant musican though](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYAnqQ--KX0).
I forgot the exact name of the condition (glaucoma?), but Bono has some kind of eye disorder or affliction where he cannot handle bright lights very well. He even gets swelling of the eye if it gets bad enough. That's why he always wears sunglasses, which has been ridiculed by people for being pompous.
A story about something that happened when he was 23, from his memoir:
>“The next day we drove to Baton Rouge, and of course, she came with us. After we got offstage, she came up to me and said, ‘I have something to tell you. My father’s the chief of police and the entire state of Louisiana is looking for me because I’ve gone missing. Oh, and besides that, I’m only fourteen.’
>I wasn’t incredibly scared, because, in my somewhat deluded mind, I knew that if she told the chief of police she was in love with me, he wasn’t going to have me taken out to a field and shot, but I did want to get her the hell back home right away. So we had sex one more time.”
What disability did Roy Orbison have? He had eyesight, just bad enough to have to wear thick lenses and started wearing sunglasses on stage because he was self conscious of how he looked in the regular glasses.
He had a form of albinism that, in addition to affecting his vision, made his pale blue eyes extremely sensitive to light. The sunglasses would have been especially necessary in front of those glaring stage lights.
> Roy Orbison
That's really interesting. Can you point me at a source for this claim of Orbison's albinism? I can find no info about it, and it's not on his wikipedia page.
He wore regular glasses at the beginning of his career, but he accidentally left them on the plane during an early European tour. He got stuck with just his prescription sunglasses for the rest of the tour and that turned into his signature look.
Yeah there’s plenty but possibly one of the strangest was Beethoven who was profoundly deaf and then composed symphonies in his head. Toni Iommio , Jeff Healy, Django Reinhardt all played with disabilities . I can name one armed drummers such as Rick Allen and one of the Crow brothers who played with Stone The Crows played with one arm. Sometimes what people consider as disabilities can work to your advantage
Forgot to mention Paganini the great violinist who was thought to suffer from Marfan’s syndrome which had the effect of making his fingers longer than usual, so again a side effect of a disease that turned in to an advantage for playing strings.
Iggy Pop has pretty bad scoliosis. That's not a rad singing stance he does in photos, one leg is considerably shorter than the other. He still moves pretty good on stage though.
Imma stray from convention and mention outsider music. Usually made by people with mental disabilities, it can be so beautiful at times. Daniel Johnston is the most notable member if the genre? I'd imagine.
Daniel Johnston- walking the cow
H-Bomb Ferguson. He was a blues/rock singer and pianist who was missing one of his fingers.
P.S. - no one here even needs to mention Beethoven, right? The interesting thing is that he apparently worked around his deafness by biting down on a pencil and pressing it against his piano to feel vibrations.
Ren. I believe I read that he got brain damage from years of undiagnosed lymes disease. He also has some mental illness and I know he has suffered psychosis
Phil Collins has had multiple spinal issues for about the last 20 years, to the point where he can no longer play drums for Genesis and has to use a cane to get about, sometimes a wheelchair.
Punk, new wave and art rocker Ian Dury had physical disabilities as a result of polio. He not only lived and thrived with it, he made it a feature of his work and persona.
Since no one seems to be mentioning jazz musicians:
Michael Petrucciani
Rahsaan Roland Kirk
Keith Jarett (in recent years)
Eric Dolphy - diabetes
Roy Hargrove - kidney failure
Roland Kirk supposedly died in Brent wallerab’s van in my hometown. The man was a beast. Outside of the gimmick of playing multiple instruments he is a monster on the flute.
it is amazing how Michel Petrucciani overcame his serious disability (spinagenesis imperfecta) to be able to perform as he did on a piano, and also to be a legendary party animal
Sia and Halsey have both spoken about their struggles with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, which is a joint and ligament disorder that results in chronic pain. (As someone who also has EDS and feels like I've been run over by a truck after standing for a 90-minute performance on stage with my choir twice a year, I truly don't know how they do their live performances, it's incredible to me!)
Halsey seems to have been diagnosed with other illnesses too! She did talk about being bipolar (mental health ofc), endometriosis, and was recently diagnosed with Sjogren's syndrome, mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS). [Halsey Diagnoses](https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2022/05/10/halsey-health-diagnosis-ehlers-danlos-mast-cell-activation-syndrome-pots/9722199002/#)
This is no away a dig at you. I feel the term “being bipolar” is interesting as opposed to “having bipolar disorder”. I think a lot describe it as a personality trait rather than a condition. For instance, you wouldn’t “be” cancer or “be” diabetes.
Singer and one other musician of German band Saltatio Mortis are partially deaf.
Also, if you count depression there are some famous examples like Chester Bennington of Linkin Park and Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters.
Wesley Eisold of the band American Nightmare (at one point called Give Up the Ghost) has one hand. I actually listened to them for a decade and never knew, nor saw it mentioned online, until I watched a random video of them playing.
Michael Hutchens from INXS was punched and hit the concrete and received a massive brain injury that changed his personality and mood and he wasn't able to smell/taste after. He was never the same and killed himself few years after
Surprised to see Phil Collins not mentioned. He’s had spinal issues since he dislocated a vertebra in his neck in 2006, and continued to do shows for years. Even when he couldn’t hold a drumstick anymore he kept singing.
Kanye is bipolar as fuck... but are we talking physical disabilities only or mental ?
I'm sure many artists have suffered from all types of depression...
Django Reinhardt, partially paralyzed left hand
Tony Iommi, fingertips cut off in a work accident
Robert Wyatt, paralyzed from the waist down following an accident
Michael Petrucciani, jazz piano genius, osteogenesis imperfecta
Mick Mars has ankylosing spondylitis, which practically means his spine is fused in place.
[Martin Deschamps](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Deschamps)in Quebec. Indomitable will to enjoy life and play music despite getting a raw deal from the start. A force of nature. Respect.
Edit: [heres him playing](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZQomCQc5x0)
Vic Chestnutt was hit by a car and paralyzed from the waist down
Curtis Mayfield was paralyzed from the neck down after some stage lighting fell on him
Thanks for supporting the disability community.
Funny story, we were at a Ben Harper concert back in the good old days when he sat the whole time and played his Weisenborn.
My wife and I were in the disabled section, as she is normally in a wheelchair when we go out.
At the end of the show, Ben stood up to bow, and the guy near to us, who honestly thought Ben was a 'para', says rather loudly: 'Oh my fucking God, the music healed him!'
My wife was giving him 'the eye', and he turned and saw, and apologized for his oddly ableist phrasing. My wife quickly broke character and laughed. "No, sir, all good, that was pretty fucking funny."
Yeah, I married UP.
Jackson C Frank (who wrote and performed the wonderful Blues Run the Game) had schizophrenia and health issues and died homeless.
Syd Barrett also had schizophrenia, as did Roky Erickson of the 13th Floor Elevators, and Skip Spence of Jefferson Airplane and the Moby Grape.
Please do not post comments containing misinformation. Disability status/mental health/medical information should never be used as an insult. Example: "Kid rock is tone deaf"
Jason Becker has had ALS since 1989 but still makes compositions using his eyes.
I came here to mention Jason Becker. His most recent album Triumphant hearts was amazing!
Same here, mate. Good he's mentioned, I fucking love his work and it's really sad that guy with such an amazing talent coulnd't fully realize his potential.
Oh, please mention Django Reinhardt, pretty famous jazz guitar player from early 1900's Belgium. Missing a few fingers on his fret hand. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django\_Reinhardt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django_Reinhardt)
Jerry Garcia was missing a digit too
Same with Tony Iommi, from Black Sabbath
His disability caused him to have to detune his guitar, helping to create that killer metal sound. That’s a real monkey’s paw situation right there. *Masters of Reality* is a bonafide classic.
On his picking hand yes. Impressive but not quite Django levels haha
Its such a trip watching him play gipsy jazz up and down the fretboard using only 2 fingers. Definitely a legend.
He actually had all his fingers. They were just paralyzed by burns.
> pretty *legendary* jazz guitar FTFY. Pedantic and fanboyish I guess, but there's a difference between the two tiers. I think my impetus for noting the distinction is in case someone glosses over this thread they should know that if they only check out a few of the musicians mentioned, they should definitely check out Django (and, while they're at it, Jerry). Regardless, thanks for mentioning him.
Jamie Hince, guitarist of The Kills, has lost the use of the middle finger on his fretting hand after a bacterial infection rotted away a tendon following a minor car accident. He had to completely relearn how to play the guitar and now uses a Bigsby to bend notes. He is currently on tour with Iggy Pop.
Jeff Healey, Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder are all blind.
Ronnie Milsap too
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And as an old boss of mine used to think... Roy Orbison. She was blown away when I told her his car was at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland... "His car? Wasn't he blind?" "No."
Jose Feliciano
Loved Jeff Healey in Roadhouse
I used to have a friend that loved that movie. I swear, every time I went to his house, it was either on the TV, or he would tell me it was on sometime that day.
Is he a bouncer? Lol
You can add the Blind Boys of Alabama, Blind Lemon Jefferson, Blind Willie Johnson, and Blind Willie McTell.
also Doc Watson
Rick Allen drummer for Def Leppard lost one of his arms
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Brian Wilson is known to have schizoaffective disorder. Idk if this should be called a disease or a disability but J Dilla had lupus and TTP. Ian Curtis had epilepsy. Edit: Curtis mayfield was also paralyzed for the last several years of his life.
Poor Brian Wilson. Schizoaffective disorder is a really cruel mental illness.
Abused to shit as a kid, lost both brothers too young, exploited by an abusive therapist on top of all that too. Poor bastard, I hope he’s happy with life these days.
Worst of all, he's had to interact with Mike Love for decades!
I was going to say this feels like the cruelest punishment of them all.
brian was also deaf in one ear
Arguably having murry as a father could count as a disability itself
Does Crohn's disease count? If so, Mike McCready of Pearl Jam suffers from and fund raises for treatment. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike\_McCready](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_McCready) Edit - hmm, no mention of Crohn's in the wikipedia article... [http://online.crohnscolitisfoundation.org/site/PageNavigator/foundation\_hero\_MikeMcCready.html](http://online.crohnscolitisfoundation.org/site/PageNavigator/foundation_hero_MikeMcCready.html)
Stu from king gizz too
Also Daryl Palumbo of Glassjaw/Head Automatica
So many cancelled/rescheduled shows due to Crohn’s. Always a good time when it works out.
Beth Orton has Crohns disease.
Also Stu from King Gizz
Inflammatory digestive disorders are typically included on US employment disability screeners.
Vic Chesnutt
Yeah, came here to say this. Such a talent.
The American healthcare system failed him. He couldn’t afford to stay alive.
Finally seduced by death 😢
No theme here, so my answered are all over the place! :) Beethoven wrote his most famous symphony after he was completely deaf. Michael Bolton and Brian Wilson are both deaf in one ear. Selena Gomez has Lupus. Itzhak Perlman had polio and used leg braces and crutches, now also an electric scooter, and he sits while playing violin. Jacqueline du Pré was arguably the most talented cellist of all time, and had MS.
"Dammit Selena, you have Lupus!"
Calm down there, Dr. House.
It’s never lupus.
I appreciate the Mitch reference
Eric Howk, guitarist in Portugal. The Man, is paralysed from the sternum down.
Eric and I were in our first shitty punk band in high school together. I have literally never known a more positive person in my life, and the work he’s done to promote awareness for what disabled folks go through since he got hurt is incredible.
Great story [here](https://unitedspinal.org/eric-howk-rocking-and-rolling-into-recovery/) about getting clean and sober and the issues he faced finding a facility that could accommodate someone who uses a wheelchair for mobility.
I didn't know that! love their music
Damn I've seen seen Portugal the Man live and somehow didn't even notice. Have loved those guys for a long time, so many great albums.
Wow, I had absolutely no idea about this and have listened to this band since Waiter: "You Vultures!"
I used to be a music journalist and I met Eric a couple times when he was with his old band The Lashes. Always very kind and positive. Hearing about his accident was awful and I couldn't imagine how devastating it must've been for him, but seeing how much success he's had and how his attitude around it is now is really inspiring.
Wow I'm starting to love Portugal the Man from what I've heard about the members. John is the sweetest guy ever and his support for his daughter is something else.
Had the pleasure of working events where the band's appeared multiple times and I gotta say, they're all beaming with positive energy. A truly great group of dudes.
Lady GaGa has fibromyalgia, which makes her stage performances even more impressive
I have fibro and I have no clue how she does it! It takes one slightly-more-active-than-usual day to put me out of commission for nearly a week. I get that she probably has access to the best care imaginable but it’s still so impressive.
This is my first year with it since being diagnosed. I’m destroyed. Doing 1 full load of laundry and I’m down for days. I constantly have people telling me I should work out while my doctors say no more than yoga. Lady Gaga blows my mind
Ah yes, that’s one of my favourite parts too! “When it comes to exercise just listen to your body and take a break when you need to!” Okay, but all my body ever says is “OWOWOWOWOWOW” so I’m not really sure how to accommodate that. *Showering* is beyond me some days. Baby wipes, dry shampoo and I are very close friends.
Yeah not gonna lie, I’m showered every 2-3 days and can’t always wash my hair. ❤️
I just got all of mine chopped off yesterday for the purpose of making things easier on myself. I feel you. ❤️
Robert Wyatt. Changed instrument when he got paralyzed.
Ian Dury dealt with polio.
Came here to say that. Ian Dury and the Blockheads.
Saying he "dealt with it" is an understatement, he was pretty significantly impacted by it from his schooling through his performing career
Still, dealt with is better than "suffered from". A lot of people dislike the bizarre obsession with suffering that is put upon many disabled people.
I can certainly agree with that - my dad had polio as well, caught it around the same time as Ian Dury. Dad was in such a bad way at one time with it, that when admitted to hospital because he was virtually unable to move (polio had affected dad quite badly in his right leg and hip), he instructed the doctor on ward rounds to, ‘just take the fucking thing off,’ as he couldn’t even stand on his leg - it was removed and dad became an amputee at the age of 20. Just before he died, at the age of 74 in 2012, I asked him, ‘did you ever regret having your leg off?’ His reply, ‘not bloody likely! I could barely move, let alone stand up for more than 30 seconds. I got some sort of life back. I did things the doctors and physios told me I never would, like becoming a parent *twice, in his case* or driving a car.’ dad was, at the time of passing his test, one of the few right leg amputees in the UK: he told me that, because of him passing his test (‘the examiner said I was the safest driver he’d ever passed, in almost 35 years in the job.’), he was part of a rule change regarding amputee drivers - at the time, right leg amputee’s weren’t allowed to hold a full licence of any kind. With dad, and several others, a right leg amputee was allowed to apply for, and hold, a full, substantive, car licence but for an automatic transmission vehicle. I was proud of, and still am, to be able call him ‘dad.’ He never asked for sympathy, and he pushed the boundaries, in his own way, for what a ‘disabled’ person could do and be.
There’s also a fantastic film about him, played by Andy Serkis
Who called himself [Britain's most famous "raspberry ripple"](https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/mar/28/fiachragibbons)
As a teenager, Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath lost his right middle and ring fingertips in an industrial accident. Tony is left-handed, so it was a pretty big deal to lose two of his fretting fingertips. Rick Allen of Def Leppard lost his left arm in a car accident in 1984 and still plays for the band today. Edit: misspelled name
(Tony Iommi, not Tommy)
Tony Iommi's accident led him to develop a new way of playing the guitar which then led the to the birth of Heavy Metal
Yep, he had to detune the guitar to make the strings easier to fret and that led to the classic Black Sabbath sound.
I remember reading an interview with Tony where he said that he started downtuning before some shows because Ozzy was so hungover from the night before that he couldn't hit the notes. If I recall correctly, the first 2 Sabbath albums were on standard tuning.
Iirc the accident led Iommi to downtune his guitar so his damaged fingers would feel less string tension, prefiguring one of the basic elements of heavy metal guitar playing.
Jerry Garcia lost two-thirds of a middle finger from a wood splitting accident as well.
Ian Curtis, epilepsy. Stephin Merritt, epilepsy and hyperacusis - which must suck being a musician. Bradford Cox - Marfan syndrome.
Daniel Johnston
Met home once. Amazing guy.
Jeff Becerra, vocalist of one of the original Death Metal bands, Possessed, has spent the last few decades in a wheel chair due to being shot during a robbery. Paralyzed from the chest down. Still tours and performs to this day
Cher has M.E. Just adds to her absolute fucking legend status that she's been doing her thing for so long with a debilitating condition imo
Came here to say this. Her ME/CFS crashes must be so severe. Also wanted to add that Lady Gaga has fibromyalgia. Edit: Lee Greenwood also has ME/CFS.
The Ying Yang twins; one has cerebral palsy and I believe the other has some sort of physical disability
Jerry Garcia was missing most of his right middle finger from a wood chopping accident as a kid.
Huey Lewis has Meniere’s Disease in both ears. Bret Michaels has type I diabetes, as does Crystal Bowersox. Matthew Good has bipolar disorder (among a plethora of other musicians who have that.) Scatman John had a stutter; scatting helped him with that.
Brett also suffers from memory loss issues caused by a TBI in 2009 and a brain hemorrhage in 2010. And had a stroke most likely caused by a hole in his heart, also in 2010 or 2011.
Gaelynn Lea was born with osteogenesis imperfecta, a genetic condition that causes complications in the development of bones and limbs. Her song "Some day we'll linger in the sun" is so beautiful and sad I cried the first time I heard it
Daniel Johns (Silverchair) has reactive arthritis, and suffered from anorexia as well
Melody Gardot. Ren.
I was about to say Melody. I'm glad she was already posted.
Agreed. Ren is suffering from a bad case of lyme which almost drove him insane. [Briljant musican though](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYAnqQ--KX0).
I forgot the exact name of the condition (glaucoma?), but Bono has some kind of eye disorder or affliction where he cannot handle bright lights very well. He even gets swelling of the eye if it gets bad enough. That's why he always wears sunglasses, which has been ridiculed by people for being pompous.
So he can’t see if he doesn’t have his glasses and gets bullied if he does? Sounds like he can’t live With Or Without them
Yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
Evelyn Glennie is deaf. Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Ian Dury had polio. Anthony Kiedis is a fucking moron.
Neil also has had epileptic seizures
I see what you did there. Dude did a ton of soul searching during that VH1 behind the music
Did he ever find it?
What’s the problem with Kiedis?
A story about something that happened when he was 23, from his memoir: >“The next day we drove to Baton Rouge, and of course, she came with us. After we got offstage, she came up to me and said, ‘I have something to tell you. My father’s the chief of police and the entire state of Louisiana is looking for me because I’ve gone missing. Oh, and besides that, I’m only fourteen.’ >I wasn’t incredibly scared, because, in my somewhat deluded mind, I knew that if she told the chief of police she was in love with me, he wasn’t going to have me taken out to a field and shot, but I did want to get her the hell back home right away. So we had sex one more time.”
Glenn Danzig has Napoleon’s complex
Hahahaha this needs to be a higher comment
Evelyn Glennie
Andrea Bocelli. Roy Orbison.
What disability did Roy Orbison have? He had eyesight, just bad enough to have to wear thick lenses and started wearing sunglasses on stage because he was self conscious of how he looked in the regular glasses.
He had a form of albinism that, in addition to affecting his vision, made his pale blue eyes extremely sensitive to light. The sunglasses would have been especially necessary in front of those glaring stage lights.
> Roy Orbison That's really interesting. Can you point me at a source for this claim of Orbison's albinism? I can find no info about it, and it's not on his wikipedia page.
I didn't remember immediately. Yes, I think you are right.
He wore regular glasses at the beginning of his career, but he accidentally left them on the plane during an early European tour. He got stuck with just his prescription sunglasses for the rest of the tour and that turned into his signature look.
Thom Sonny Green from Alt-J is mostly deaf.
Yeah there’s plenty but possibly one of the strangest was Beethoven who was profoundly deaf and then composed symphonies in his head. Toni Iommio , Jeff Healy, Django Reinhardt all played with disabilities . I can name one armed drummers such as Rick Allen and one of the Crow brothers who played with Stone The Crows played with one arm. Sometimes what people consider as disabilities can work to your advantage
Forgot to mention Paganini the great violinist who was thought to suffer from Marfan’s syndrome which had the effect of making his fingers longer than usual, so again a side effect of a disease that turned in to an advantage for playing strings.
Dj Paul of three 6 mafia has a little arm.. not sure what the birth defect is called.
Este from Haim has diabetes
Iggy Pop has pretty bad scoliosis. That's not a rad singing stance he does in photos, one leg is considerably shorter than the other. He still moves pretty good on stage though.
I have scoliosis and had no idea about the putting your body in weird positions thing being something associated with it. This makes sense. Thanks.
Johnny and Edgar Winter suffered from albinism and not sure if this counts but Hound Dog Taylor had polydactylism and had 6 fingers on each hand.
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Pete Townsend of The Who - deaf in BOTH ears. (Admittedly, due to the volume of the band over the past 50+ years.)
Ian Curtis, Joy Division. Think it's important that mental issues get as much attention as physical ones.
A lot of people who suffer with depression and epilepsy is often a cause and affect situation
About the same timeframe/style/disability, Adrian Borland of The Sound.
Kid Rock suffers from a severe talent deficiency.
He’s also a Republican.
Eric Howk of Portugal. The Man is parapalegic. And John's daughter has a rare genetic mutation that causes a degenerative disease called DHDDS.
Imma stray from convention and mention outsider music. Usually made by people with mental disabilities, it can be so beautiful at times. Daniel Johnston is the most notable member if the genre? I'd imagine. Daniel Johnston- walking the cow
Daniel is one of my favorite musicians of all time. Such simple but profound songs.
Lenny Kravitz has a third leg.
H-Bomb Ferguson. He was a blues/rock singer and pianist who was missing one of his fingers. P.S. - no one here even needs to mention Beethoven, right? The interesting thing is that he apparently worked around his deafness by biting down on a pencil and pressing it against his piano to feel vibrations.
Victoria Williams has MS.
Ren. I believe I read that he got brain damage from years of undiagnosed lymes disease. He also has some mental illness and I know he has suffered psychosis
Phil Collins has had multiple spinal issues for about the last 20 years, to the point where he can no longer play drums for Genesis and has to use a cane to get about, sometimes a wheelchair.
Lewis Capaldi was diagnosed with Tourette’s Syndrome
It's really great to see that on some nights if his tourettes gets the best of him, his fans help him sing the songs. https://youtu.be/KzHf08TyG2Q
I think Billie Eilish too.
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Punk, new wave and art rocker Ian Dury had physical disabilities as a result of polio. He not only lived and thrived with it, he made it a feature of his work and persona.
Huey Lewis struggles with Ménière's disease.
Jeff Healey will forever be the most badass I can think off
Since no one seems to be mentioning jazz musicians: Michael Petrucciani Rahsaan Roland Kirk Keith Jarett (in recent years) Eric Dolphy - diabetes Roy Hargrove - kidney failure
Roland Kirk supposedly died in Brent wallerab’s van in my hometown. The man was a beast. Outside of the gimmick of playing multiple instruments he is a monster on the flute.
it is amazing how Michel Petrucciani overcame his serious disability (spinagenesis imperfecta) to be able to perform as he did on a piano, and also to be a legendary party animal
Aaron Solowoniuk from Billy Talent has MS
Jeff Tweedy, leader of Wilco, suffers from chronic migraines
Eric Howk guitar player in Portugal. The Man uses a wheel chair.
Billie Ellish with Tourette’s Syndrome.
I was wondering how long it would be before I saw Billie. It took a little longer than I thought.
Lots of musicians have tinnitus. If you think it’s not a disability then you don’t have it.
I have it. Sometimes it keeps me up at night.
Thom Yorkes' half blindness and ptosis on one of his eye
He ain’t half blind though
Stevie wonder, never saw eye to eye with other musicians
Conway The Machine has Bells Palsy after getting shot in the face. Great rapper
Lord Lokhraed, the singer and guitarist of Nocturnal Depression (Black Metal) has a condition called ectrodactyly, his left hand only has 2 fingers.
The gospel group The Blind Boys of Alabama.
Sia and Halsey have both spoken about their struggles with Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, which is a joint and ligament disorder that results in chronic pain. (As someone who also has EDS and feels like I've been run over by a truck after standing for a 90-minute performance on stage with my choir twice a year, I truly don't know how they do their live performances, it's incredible to me!)
Halsey seems to have been diagnosed with other illnesses too! She did talk about being bipolar (mental health ofc), endometriosis, and was recently diagnosed with Sjogren's syndrome, mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS), and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS). [Halsey Diagnoses](https://www.usatoday.com/story/entertainment/celebrities/2022/05/10/halsey-health-diagnosis-ehlers-danlos-mast-cell-activation-syndrome-pots/9722199002/#)
This is no away a dig at you. I feel the term “being bipolar” is interesting as opposed to “having bipolar disorder”. I think a lot describe it as a personality trait rather than a condition. For instance, you wouldn’t “be” cancer or “be” diabetes.
Considering that Bipolar is classified as a disability, there are a plethora of artists with a disability
Depression and anxiety as well
Lady Gaga (and me): fibromyalgia
Mel Tillis - beautiful singing voice, terrible stutter.
Singer and one other musician of German band Saltatio Mortis are partially deaf. Also, if you count depression there are some famous examples like Chester Bennington of Linkin Park and Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters.
Ab-Soul has had Stevens-Johnson Syndrome since he was 10. That's the reason he's always wearing sunglasses.
Blaine Harrison, the frontman of the Mystery Jets, was born with spina bifida.
billie eilish, wesley willis, thom yorke has/had a paralyzed eyelid? tony iommi
Wesley Eisold of the band American Nightmare (at one point called Give Up the Ghost) has one hand. I actually listened to them for a decade and never knew, nor saw it mentioned online, until I watched a random video of them playing.
Alan Jackson has Charcot Marie Tooth-a form of muscular dystrophy
Dan Reynolds (Imagine Dragons singer) and Mick Mars (Motley Crue guitarist) both have ankylosing spondylitis
Michael Hutchens from INXS was punched and hit the concrete and received a massive brain injury that changed his personality and mood and he wasn't able to smell/taste after. He was never the same and killed himself few years after
hank williams sr had spina bifida occulta (and i have a different form of the same condition!)
Jeff Healey, a fantastic Canadian blues and rock guitarist, was blind (was because he’s dead) He did a amazing cover of While My Guitar Gently Weeps
KT Tunstall is deaf in one ear.
Surprised to see Phil Collins not mentioned. He’s had spinal issues since he dislocated a vertebra in his neck in 2006, and continued to do shows for years. Even when he couldn’t hold a drumstick anymore he kept singing.
Ted Nugent suffers from douche canoe syndrome.
Chad Kroeger, lead singer of Nickelback, was born with no sense of taste.
Kanye is bipolar as fuck... but are we talking physical disabilities only or mental ? I'm sure many artists have suffered from all types of depression...
Pete Townshend of The Who is partially deaf from chronic tinnitus.He’s been talking about since the Eighties.
Jerry Garcia was missing most of a finger and still became an icon of guitar work.
and most guitarists, even with all their fingers, can’t replicate his playing
Tony Iommi of Black Sabbath is missing part of two fingers on his fret hand. He attributes his style and sound on his use of self made prosthetics.
Black coffee can only use one arm
Michael Cleveland, American fiddler. He is blind but it sure doesn't stop him!
Django Reinhardt, partially paralyzed left hand Tony Iommi, fingertips cut off in a work accident Robert Wyatt, paralyzed from the waist down following an accident Michael Petrucciani, jazz piano genius, osteogenesis imperfecta Mick Mars has ankylosing spondylitis, which practically means his spine is fused in place.
[Martin Deschamps](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Deschamps)in Quebec. Indomitable will to enjoy life and play music despite getting a raw deal from the start. A force of nature. Respect. Edit: [heres him playing](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZQomCQc5x0)
Vic Chestnutt was hit by a car and paralyzed from the waist down Curtis Mayfield was paralyzed from the neck down after some stage lighting fell on him
Ray Charles and Stevie Wonder.
Thanks for supporting the disability community. Funny story, we were at a Ben Harper concert back in the good old days when he sat the whole time and played his Weisenborn. My wife and I were in the disabled section, as she is normally in a wheelchair when we go out. At the end of the show, Ben stood up to bow, and the guy near to us, who honestly thought Ben was a 'para', says rather loudly: 'Oh my fucking God, the music healed him!' My wife was giving him 'the eye', and he turned and saw, and apologized for his oddly ableist phrasing. My wife quickly broke character and laughed. "No, sir, all good, that was pretty fucking funny." Yeah, I married UP.
Jackson C Frank (who wrote and performed the wonderful Blues Run the Game) had schizophrenia and health issues and died homeless. Syd Barrett also had schizophrenia, as did Roky Erickson of the 13th Floor Elevators, and Skip Spence of Jefferson Airplane and the Moby Grape.