King Curtis

With his beginnings as a sessionman in the '50s, King Curtis perfected his hard-playing tenor sax skills. After playing with Buddy Holly and on tracks like the Coasters' "Yakety Yak," he began cutting his own pop/soul/jazz records, ultimately scoring a hit with the swinging "Soul Twist" in 1962. His prolific output and session work continued -- Curtis offered a notable performance on John Lennon's Imagine, for instance -- until he was murdered outside his New York apartment in 1971.