Musician Chinnock dies at 59 Composer suffered from Lyme disease

YARMOUTH – Bill Chinnock, a songwriter, guitarist, Emmy-award winning composer and longtime Maine resident, died Thursday. He was 59.

Chinnock had been suffering from Lyme disease, and police said they were called to his home by his live-in caregiver. Lt. Dean Perry would not comment on the cause of death but said “it is not of a suspicious nature.”

Chinnock’s manager, Paul Pappas, told WCSH-TV, Portland, that he had committed suicide.

“He fought a hard battle with his disease,” said Chinnock’s sister, Caroline Payne of Yarmouth.

Chinnock was born and raised in Newark, N.J., and as a young musician became involved in the Asbury Park music scene that fostered stars such as Bruce Springsteen and Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes. Chinnock regularly performed in the same nightclubs as Springsteen, and several of his former band mates later became part of Springsteen’s E Street Band.

Legendary Columbia Records producer John Hammond Sr. took Chinnock under his wing, and encouraged him to get away from New Jersey and to focus on his songwriting and guitar playing. At the age of 20 Chinnock moved to Maine, where he remained for most of the rest of his life.

Chinnock released 10 albums over the course of 30 years, from the hard-edged R&B of 1978’s “Badlands”, released on Atlantic Records, to the rootsy, more blues-influenced sound of his most recent release, 2002’s “Livin’ In the Promised Land.”

Chinnock toured and performed with the likes of Albert King, John Lee Hooker and the Doobie Brothers during his long career.

Until recent years, Chinnock was a fixture on the Maine music scene, performing throughout the state in venues as small as the now-defunct Ram’s Horn at the University of Maine, to ones as large as the Bangor Auditorium and Merrill Auditorium in Portland, as well as the Bangor State Fair. His devotion to the Maine music scene earned him the nickname “The Legend of the North Country.”

In the mid-1990s Chinnock formed The Artist Group, a business devoted to filmmaking, graphic design, computer animation, Web site design and music composition.

He also was a prolific composer for film and television, and received an Emmy Award in 1987 for Musical Direction and Composition for his song “Somewhere in the Night.” He was nominated for a composing Emmy again the following year, and in 1992 recorded a duet with Roberta Flack that became a theme song for the soap opera “Guiding Light.”

In addition to composing for film, Chinnock directed several features, including “Forgotten Maine,” a documentary that explored Maine’s changing face in a corporate world, and a documentary profile of the Cianbro construction company.

Chinnock is survived by his wife, Terry, and sons William and John. Funeral arrangements have not yet been announced.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.