If you enjoy listening to the melodic tunes of The Doors, then you’ve witnessed the work of Ray Manzarek.
Raymond Daniel Manzarek was born in 1939 on the Southside of Chicago. As a child, Ray began taking piano lessons at age 7. He attended St. Rita High School, where he played in a band with his two brothers for school dances and talent shows. He continued to play throughout his time at DePaul University, and graduated with a degree in economics. It wasn’t until he moved to California to attend the UCLA film school that he met his future lifelong wife Dorothy Fujikawa, and fellow film student and poet Jim Morrison. After meeting, the pair decided to combine Morrison’s poetry and Manzarek’s piano prowess in order to create a band. The Doors formed in 1965 after Robby Krieger’s guitar and John Densmore’s drums were added. Manzarek provided the hypnotic and intoxicating undertones for the Doors on a Vox Continental combo organ, a very popular instrument used by numerous other acid rock bands of the late 60s and 70s.
Manzarek and The Doors started out slow, playing small nightclubs and bars on a nightly basis, but they eventually saw success after songs like “Light My Fire” and “Break on through” became immensely popular. Manzarek played the organ on all six studio albums that The Doors released under Elektra Records, but Jim Morrison’s untimely death in 1971 brought the band’s success to a halt. Manzarek went on to produce a few solo albums, play keyboard for numerous bands and eventually collaborate with Densmore and Krieger on tour and on television. Ray and his wife Dorothy had one son, Pablo, and three grandchildren. In May of 2013, Manzarek died of cancer.
The influence that The Doors had on music still lives on today, as rereleases of their live albums and video footage are still being produced on a yearly basis.
