Don Van Vliet (, born Don Glen Vliet ;

Noted for his powerful singing voice with its wide range, Van Vliet also played the harmonica, saxophone and numerous other wind instruments.

During his teen years in Lancaster, California, Van Vliet developed an eclectic musical taste and formed " a mutually useful but volatile " friendship with Frank Zappa, with whom he sporadically competed and collaborated.

Van Vliet has been described as " one of modern music's true innovators " with " a singular body of work virtually unrivalled in its daring and fluid creativity ".

Known for his enigmatic personality and relationship with the public, Van Vliet made few public appearances after his retirement from music ( and from his Beefheart persona ) in 1982.

Van Vliet was born Don Glen Vliet in Glendale, California, on January 15, 1941, to Glen Alonzo Vliet, a service station owner of Dutch ancestry from Kansas, and Willie Sue Vliet ( née Warfield ), who was from Arkansas.

He claimed to have as an ancestor Peter Van Vliet, a Dutch painter who knew Rembrandt.

Van Vliet also claimed that he was related to adventurer and author Richard Halliburton and the cowboy actor Slim Pickens, and said that he remembered being born.

Van Vliet began painting and sculpting at age three.

For some time during the 1950s Van Vliet worked as an apprentice with Rodrigues, who considered him a child prodigy.

Van Vliet later admitted personal hesitation to take the scholarship based upon the bitterness of his parents ' disencouragement.

Van Vliet remained interested in art ; his paintings, often reminiscent of Franz Kline's, were later featured on several of his own albums.

Van Vliet claimed that he never attended public school, alleging " half a day of kindergarten " to be the extent of his formal education and saying that " if you want to be a different fish, you've got to jump out of the school.

While attending Antelope Valley High School in Lancaster, Van Vliet became close friends with fellow teenager Frank Zappa, the pair bonding through their interest in Chicago blues and R & B.

Van Vliet is portrayed in both The Real Frank Zappa Book and Barry Miles ' biography Zappa as fairly spoiled at this stage of his life, the center of attention as an only child.

After Zappa began regular occupation at Paul Buff's PAL Studio in Cucamonga he and Van Vliet began collaborating, tentatively as " The Soots ".

" In a 1970 interview with Rolling Stone, Van Vliet requests " don't ask me why or how " he and Zappa came up with the name.

Van Vliet enrolled at Antelope Valley Junior College as an art major, but decided to leave the following year.

" After managing a Kinney's shoe store, Van Vliet relocated to Rancho Cucamonga, California, to reconnect with Zappa, who inspired his entry into musical performance.

Van Vliet was quite shy but was eventually able to imitate the deep voice of Howlin ' Wolf with his wide vocal range.

Roughly half of these advisors have since died, including some of the Outline's chief architects: Rene Dubos ( d. 1982 ), Loren Eiseley ( d. 1977 ), Harold D. Lasswell ( d. 1978 ), Mark Van Doren ( d. 1972 ), Peter Ritchie Calder ( d. 1982 ) and Mortimer J. Adler ( d. 2001 ).

In 1664, a second attempt was made, but this one also ended badly as the men chosen for the job abandoned their sick commander, Van Niewland, without proper treatment, and the latter eventually died.

After 12 years of marriage, Hannah Van Buren contracted tuberculosis and died on February 5, 1819, at the age of 35.

After being bedridden with a case of pneumonia during the fall of 1861, Martin Van Buren died of bronchial asthma and heart failure at his Lindenwald estate in Kinderhook at 2: 00 a. m. on July 24, 1862.

** Mona Van Duyn, American poet ( died 2004 )

The Michael Werner Gallery announced on Friday, December 17, 2010, that Van Vliet had died at a hospital in Arcata, California, weeks short of his 70th birthday.

The cancer eventually spread to his esophagus ; he ultimately died of pneumonia on November 22, 1986 at his home in Van Nuys, California.

Dobson was only able to make a modest living in the 1630s, but when Van Dyck died in 1641, he was able to get more royal commissions.

On May 2, 2000, the Vietnamese Communist Party and the Vietnamese government announced that Pham Van Dong, former Politburo member, former prime minister, had died in Hanoi on April 29, 2000 after several months of serious illness at the age of 94.

Van Slyke was a veteran of the War of 1812 and died on September 25, 1834.

In the summer of 1847, a number of settlers died and many of the Norwegian immigrants moved to Four Mile Prairie in Van Zandt County and Prairieville in Kaufman County, also established by Reiersen.

Van Dyke, who died in 1943, and the script was one of two not written by the husband and wife team of Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich who had worked with Dashiell Hammett to develop the Nick and Nora characters earlier in the series.

* Thomas De Van Nguyen ( died 1839 ), of the Vietnamese Martyrs

* June 1-John Van Druten, dramatist ( died 1957 )

Huntley Gordon died in Van Nuys, California and was interred in the Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale, California.

* August 3-Walter Van Tilburg Clark, novelist ( died 1971 )

Van der Weyden died on 18 June 1464, and was buried in the Chapel of St Catherine in the Cathedral of St Gudulphe.

* June 17-Carl Van Vechten, writer ( died 1964 )

An adaptation of Joyce Maynard's novel, the black comedy starred Nicole Kidman as a murderously ambitious weather girl ; it also featured Van Sant favorite Matt Dillon as her hapless husband and, the third Phoenix sibling in as many projects, Joaquin Phoenix, as her equally hapless lover ( River had died from a drug overdose a year and half earlier ).

In 1890, Vincent Van Gogh died.

Taylor died in Chicago of a heart attack and was buried in Van Horn Cemetery, Findlay, Ohio.

The other major leaders, Van Egmond, Samuel Lount, and Peter Matthews were arrested by the British ; Van Egmond died in prison, and Lount and Matthews were executed at 8 AM on April 12, 1838, in Toronto.

By 1916 Rutherford had become one of the seven directors of the Watch Tower Society ; when Russell died on October 31, 1916 he joined vice-President Alfred I. Ritchie and Secretary-Treasurer William E. Van Amburgh on a three-man executive committee that ran the Pennsylvania corporation until a new president was elected at the annual general meeting the following January.