Sam Moore, Half of Sam & Dave Duo, Dies at 89

Sam Moore, one-half of the Sam & Dave duo, died on Friday, Jan. 10. He was 89.

The celebrated R&B singer died after surgery in Coral Gables, Fla., his wife and longtime manager, Joyce Moor, confirmed to The New York Times.

Moore was born in Miami on Oct. 12, 1935. He started professional singing in the late 1950s when he met his future partner, Dave Prater. By 1961, they met again at the King of Hearts club in Miami and soon began performing together as a music group. By 1964, Atlantic Records watched the two perform and then offered them a contract.

Throughout the 1960s, they hit their stride, and the pair released R&B hits, including “Hold On, I’m Comin,’ ” “I Thank You,” and “Soul Man.” The latter topped the charts and hit No. 2 on the pop charts in 1967. The track also won a Grammy for best rhythm & blues group performance, vocal or instrumental.

The two split in 1970 and Moore recorded a solo album, Plenty Good Lovin’, which was released in 2002.

Throughout their careers, they would break up and reunite several times when their solo careers did not reach the success they wanted.

“It was a duo,” Moore said in the 1998 book Sam and Dave: An Oral History. “But it wasn’t a partnership.”

The pair performed together for the final time on New Year’s Eve 1981 in San Francisco, and once they left the stage, they never spoke again, per The New York Times. Around the same time, they both struggled with a heroin addiction. After meeting Joyce McRae, she eventually became his manager and urged him to participate in trials for anti-opiate treatments. By 1983, he went public with his addiction and volunteered with people struggling with the same issue.

During his solo career, Moore toured with several performers, including Bruce Springsteen. Meanwhile, Prater recruited a new partner, Sam Daniels, and they worked together and called themselves Sam & Dave, despite Moore’s objections. The original duo were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1992. Six years later, Prater died in a fatal car accident.

In 2019, the duo received a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award in 2019.

Moore is survived by his wife, Joyce, their daughter Michelle, and grandchildren Tash, and Misha.