Trumpet player Freddie Hubbard, 70

Freddie Hubbard died 29 December 2008, at Sherman Oaks Hospital as a result of a heart attack suffered in late November. His name might not blow up the same marquee lights as that of the late Eartha Kitt, whom we lost on Christmas Day, but anyone who cultivates even a passing interest in jazz certainly knows Hubbard's swift, mercury-smooth trumpet sound, whether they realize it or not.

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Cellist Valentin Berlinsky dies at 83

Valentin Berlinsky, for six decades the cellist of the Borodin Quartet, one of the most renowned string quartets in the world and by all accounts the longest continuously playing one, died on 15 December 2008, in Moscow. He was 83 and had lived in Moscow most of his life. The death was announced on the quartet’s Web site, [LINK], which gave no cause.

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Singer Eartha Kitt dies

Eartha Kitt, a sultry singer, dancer and actress who rose from South Carolina cotton fields to become an international symbol of elegance and sensuality, has died, a family spokesman said. She was 81.

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Jazz pianist, composer Page Cavanaugh dies at 86

Page Cavanaugh, whose trio played in films and on Frank Sinatra's radio show, died Dec. 19, 2008 of kidney failure in Granada Hills, Calif. He was 86.
In the late '40s and early '50s, The Page Cavanaugh Trio was popular as a nightclub act, on recordings and in feature films such as "Romance on the High Seas" with Doris Day.

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