The Days the Music Died

We know how their music changed the world. But what really happened on the flights that ended their lives?Patsy Cline. Otis Redding. Jim Croce. Lynyrd Skynyrd. Randy Rhoads. Ricky Nelson. Stevie Ray Vaughan. John Denver. Aaliyah. Jenni Rivera. James Horner. Glenn Miller. Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper. Different generations. Different music. Twenty-one flights, across six decades, that ended the same way.In The Days the Music Died, pilot and filmmaker Dan Millican goes beyond the headlines and the legends to examine the aviation accidents behind some of music's greatest losses. Drawing on official accident records, historical reporting, eyewitness accounts, and his own years in the cockpit, he reconstructs what happened, separates fact from folklore, and explains the flying in language anyone can understand.You do not need to be a pilot to follow it. You only need to have wondered.Some stories reveal tragic mistakes. Others raise questions that remain unanswered. All of them are told under the same discipline: no speculation, no blame the record will not carry, and never a guess at what a pilot was thinking in his last minutes.The full roster: Patsy Cline, Jim Reeves, Otis Redding, Jim Croce, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Randy Rhoads, Keith Green, Stan Rogers, Ricky Nelson, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Reba McEntire's band, Walter Hyatt, John Denver, Aaliyah, Jenni Rivera, James Horner, Troy Gentry, The Nelons, Brett James, Glenn Miller, and the flight that gave the phrase to the language: Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the Big Bopper.Written by a licensed pilot who flies the same airspace these musicians flew, and who reads accident reports the way other people read history. Their music survived. Their stories deserve to be understood.