Founding member of Steely Dan hails from Queens
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TIMESLEDGER | QNS.COM | FEB. 14-20, 2020 17
In conjunction with
the Greater Astoria
Historical Society,
TimesLedger Newspapers
presents noteworthy
events in the borough’s
history.
Born in Forest Hills,
Queens, on Feb, 20, 1950,
Walter Carl Becker was a
musician, songwriter and
record producer best known
as a founding member of the
rock group Steely Dan.
Active across six decades,
his greatest works include
the Steely Dan hits “Do It
Again,” “Rikki Don’t Lose
That Number” and “Reelin’
in the Years.” After reuniting
in the 1990s, Becker and
co-founder Donald Fagen
toured until shortly before
Becker’s death in 2017.
While a student at Bard
College, the guitarist from
Queens also performed in
a band with future comedy
movie star Chevy Chase
playing drums.
The Steely Dan co-founder
was raised in Queens
and Scarsdale, N.Y., by his
father and grandmother
after his parents separated.
After graduating from
Stuyvesant High School in
1967, he met future bandmate
Fagen while playing
at a café and they soon
formed their first band,
Leather Canary.
Becker dropped out of college
and moved to New York
City with Fagen, where they
joined the Queens-based
pop rock group Jay and the
Americans. In 1971, the musical
duo then moved to Los
Angeles, where they wrote
songs for ABC Records that
were recorded by stars including
Barbara Streisand.
Soon after moving out west,
they formed Steely Dan,
which included Becker on
bass guitar.
The band’s catchy tunes,
sometimes depicting cryptic
situations with desperate
characters from the
margins of society, soon
earned the group fame
on pop radio in the early
1970s. The group’s commercial
success peaked with
the 1977 album Aja, which
sold over 1 million copies.
Much of Steely Dan’s music
was characterized by a
rich, jazz rooted harmony
whose easy- listening feel
belied a great musical and
lyrical sophistication.
Steely Dan broke up in
1981, after the bassist from
Forest Hills developed a
drug and alcohol problem.
Becker and his family
dropped out of the music
scene for a while in the
1980s after they moved to
Hawaii to operate an avocado
farm. By the middle
of the decade, he began
producing albums for new
wave style groups. In the
early 1990s, the original
Steely Dan co-founders reunited
and began touring
again in 1993. The band
was back together.
With the classic rock
group touring for the first
time since 1974, their first
live album, Alive in America,
won four Grammy
Awards including Album of
the Year. In 2001, the band
was inducted into the Rock
and Roll Hall of Fame and
even received honorary
doctorates from the Berklee
College of Music. On
the 2003 album Everything
Must Go, the versatile guitarist
Becker sang lead vocals
on “Slang of Ages.”
Walter Becker toured
regularly with Steely Dan
well into 2017, and the band
even had residencies at venues
like the Beacon Theatre
in Becker’s home city.
The rock star from Queens
passed away that September
after a battle with cancer,
and is survived by his
wife and two children.
Reflecting on decades
spent making music together,
Donald Fagen memorialized
his friend’s contribution
to their musical
expression. “(He) was cynical
about human nature,
including his own, and
hysterically funny,” Fagen
wrote. “Like a lot of kids
from fractured families, he
had the knack of creative
mimicry, reading people’s
hidden psychology and
transforming what he saw
into bubbly, incisive art.”
Compiled by Dan McDonald
for the Greater Astoria
Historical Society. For more
information, contact the Society
at 718-278-0700 or visit
www.astorialic.org.
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