28-year-old Swedish electronic dance music artist Avicii dies in Oman
Monday, April 23, 2018
On Friday afternoon, Swedish electronic dance music artist Tim Bergling, stage name Avicii, was found dead in Oman's capital Muscat, stated his publicist Diana Baron. Baron did not specify the cause of Bergling's death in the statement and added, "the family is devastated and we ask everyone to please respect their need for privacy in this difficult time." Bergling was 28 years old.
Image: Jalil Arfaoui (flickr).
Born on September 8, 1989, in the Swedish capital Stockholm, Bergling released his first single in 2007. His single Levels, released in 2011, received a Grammy Award nomination. He released his debut album True in 2013; singles from True include Hey Brother and Wake Me Up. In October 2015, he released his second album Stories. Bergling has won American Music Awards, Billboard Music Awards and MTV Europe Music Awards. He received second Grammy nomination for Sunshine, which he collaborated with David Guetta.
In 2014, Bergling collaborated with Carlos Santana and Wyclef Jean to release We Will Find a Way, one of the anthems for that year's FIFA Men's football World Cup in Brazil. In March 2014, Bergling was hospitalised. He had surgery to remove his gall bladder and appendix that year, and had previously suffered from pancreatitis in 2012. He announced quitting touring in early 2016, after performing at the Ultra Music Festival.
Speaking to Billboard magazine, Bergling said he stopped touring for the health complications. He added, "The scene was not for me. It was not the shows and not the music. It was always the other stuff surrounding it that never came naturally to me [...] I'm more of an introverted person in general. It was always very hard for me. I took on board too much negative energy, I think".
In his twelve-year career, Bergling collaborated with Madonna, David Guetta, Jon Bon Jovi, Rita Ora, Coldplay, Aloe Blacc and Robbie Williams. Bergling had about eleven billion streams on music streaming platform Spotify. Bergling released his final EP called AVĪCI (01) in 2017, which was nominated for a Billboard award recently.
In an interview with VEVO Lift, Bergling explained about his stage name saying, "the name Avici means the lowest level of Buddhist hell". He said he added an extra 'i' since someone else was using that name on MySpace.
After Bergling's death, pop singer Madonna tweeted, "So Sad....... So Tragic. Good Bye Dear Sweet Tim. 💙 Gone too Soon."
Sources
- "Avicii, Swedish electronic dance music artist and DJ, dead at 28" — Reuters, April 21, 2018
- "Swedish star DJ Avicii dead at 28" — Al Jazeera, April 21, 2018
- "Avicii, top electronic dance music artist, found dead at 28" — BBC News Online, April 21, 2018
- Maeve McDermott. "Avicii, electronic dance music DJ, found dead in Oman at 28" — USA Today, April 20, 2018
- Jem Aswad. "Avicii Dies at 28" — Variety (magazine), April 20, 2018
