Brian Wilson

He learned harmony by taking it apart. A Four Freshmen record on the phonograph, a few seconds at a time, then the same few seconds worked out on the piano in the family house in Hawthorne, California, until the blend came back right. His church choir director found he had perfect pitch. A recital when he was 11 found something else — almost no usable hearing in his right ear, diagnosed as a nerve impingement, its cause never settled and blamed over the years on a childhood blow, a football injury and his father. Murry Wilson was a machinist and part-time songwriter who drove his three sons toward music and hit them. In the autumn of 1961 Brian and his cousin Mike Love wrote a song about surfing.

In December 1964 he broke down sobbing on a flight to Houston and gave up touring. The band toured and he stayed in Los Angeles with session players. Pet Sounds, released May 16, 1966, scored bass harmonica, accordion, sleigh bells, bicycle horn and Coca-Cola cans the way another writer scores strings, changed key inside the songs, and set chords over bass notes that did not belong to them. For "Good Vibrations" he cut fragments at four studios across seven months and spliced them into one single. The next album, Smile, collapsed in 1967. He finished it in 2004.

From 1965 on he heard voices that were not there. The auditory hallucinations never entirely stopped, and he was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder and mild bipolar disorder — a condition he had, not the reason the records sound the way they do. In 1969 his father's publishing company sold the Beach Boys song catalogue for 700,000 dollars, and Brian signed the consent form under pressure from Murry. His family brought in the psychologist Eugene Landy in 1975. Landy was dismissed over his fees, rehired in 1982, and then took nearly all of it — round-the-clock supervision, executive producer credit, business manager, co-writing credits. California charged him with ethical violations and he surrendered his psychology license in 1989. A conservatorship suit by Wilson's family ended the partnership in December 1991.

He toured for most of the next two decades behind a band of younger musicians, and the standing of the work kept climbing while he did it — Pet Sounds into the Library of Congress recording registry in 2004, second on Rolling Stone's album list in three straight revisions, a Grammy in 2005 for a piece of Smile he had abandoned in 1967, Kennedy Center Honors in 2007. Melinda Ledbetter, his second wife, died in January 2024. His family disclosed the following month that he had dementia, and a court placed him under conservatorship in May. He died at home in Beverly Hills on June 11, 2025, at 82.

Brian Wilson's life against the full span of the corpus.

• Surf City song
  Co-written for Jan and Dean — the first number one he wrote 1963
• The Beach Boys Today! album
  The orchestral turn, made in the months after he quit the road 1965
• Pet Sounds album
  Cut with session players between January and April at a cost above 70,000 dollars 1966
• Good Vibrations song
  Assembled from sections recorded at four Hollywood studios over seven months 1966
• Brian Wilson album
  His first solo album, with Eugene Landy credited as executive producer 1988
• Brian Wilson Presents Smile album
  The 1967 album completed 37 years later with Van Dyke Parks 2004

• June 20, 1942 aged 0 Born in Inglewood, California The family moved to Hawthorne after his brother Dennis was born in 1944. Carl followed in 1946.
• 1953 aged ~11 A choir recital reveals he has almost no hearing in his right ear Diagnosed as a nerve impingement. The cause has never been established.
• Autumn 1961 aged ~19 Forms a group with his two brothers, his cousin and a schoolfriend Their first song was "Surfin'". Murry managed them and Candix Records renamed them the Beach Boys.
• December 18, 1964 aged 22 Breaks down on a flight to Houston and stops touring He played the Houston show, then Glen Campbell finished the tour in his place. Earlier accounts dated this to December 23.
• May 16, 1966 aged 23 Pet Sounds is released It reached 10 in the United States and 2 in Britain, where the reviews were far warmer.
• October 10, 1966 aged 24 "Good Vibrations" is released Recorded in pieces between February 17 and September 21 at Western, Columbia and Gold Star.
• 1967 aged ~25 Abandons Smile after a year of recording A stripped-down substitute, Smiley Smile, appeared in September 1967 and was credited to the group rather than to him.
• February 2004 aged 61 Brian Wilson Presents Smile premieres at the Royal Festival Hall in London The studio version followed in September and entered the Billboard 200 at 13.
• June 11, 2025 aged 82 Dies in his sleep at his home in Beverly Hills Respiratory arrest amid sepsis and other factors. He was 82.

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