{"id":135432,"date":"2025-09-05T20:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T20:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/135432\/"},"modified":"2025-09-05T20:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T20:11:10","slug":"happy-together-singer-songwriter-with-the-turtles-was-78","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/135432\/","title":{"rendered":"“Happy Together” Singer-Songwriter With The Turtles Was 78"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tMark Volman<\/a>, a founding member of the 1960s pop group The Turtles<\/a> sang on its No. 1 hit \u201cHappy Together\u201d and whose bright harmonies also fueled such songs \u201cIt Ain\u2019t Me Babe,\u201d \u201cYou Baby,\u201d \u201cShe\u2019d Rather Be with Me\u201d and \u201cElenore,\u201d died Friday in Nashville following a brief, unexpected illness. He was 78.<\/p>\n

\n\tVolman revealed in 2023 that he had been diagnosed with Lewy body dementia in 2020, but he continued to perform on the annual \u201cHappy Together\u201d oldies tours in the years that followed.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlongside his Turtles partner Howard Kalan, Volman followed up the Turtles first burst of fame by reinventing themselves in 1970 as Flo & Eddie. Their stage show was marked by the duo\u2019s humorous antics, Volman\u2019s untamed mop of curly hair and, always, their distinctive vocal harmonies. They toured with Frank Zappa\u2019s Mothers of Invention and provided background vocals on songs including T. Rex\u2019s \u201cBang a Gong (Get It On)\u201d and later Bruce Springsteen\u2019s first Top 10 single \u201cHungry Heart.\u201d They even wrote for the children\u2019s television show Strawberry Shortcake. Camila Cabello used their song \u201cKeep It Warm\u201d in her 2024 hit single, \u201cI Luv It.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tKaylan retired in 2018 due to health issues, leaving Volman as the last original Turtles member performing with the band.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tMark Volman onstage in 1971<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEverett<\/p>\n

\n\tBorn in Los Angeles on April 19, 1947, Volman met Kaylan and they began singing together during their high school years. As The Turtles, the group\u2019s first hit came in 1965 with a cover version of Bob Dylan\u2019s \u201cIt Ain\u2019t Me Babe,\u201d and they would chart many hits over the next several years. The group\u2019s signature hit \u201cHappy Together\u201d was No. 1 on the Billboard 100 for three weeks just before the Summer of Love and went Top 10 in several other countries. It reached No. 12 in the UK.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe Turtles supported their singles releases with seeming ubiquitous appearances on TV variety shows of the era. Watch the group perform \u201cHappy Together\u201d in a 1967 appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show here:<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\n\tIn all, The Turtles scored nine Top 30 pop singles in the U.S., including five Top 10s, and \u201cShe\u2019d Rather Be with Me\u201d and \u201cElenore\u201d made the UK Top 10. Along with the songs listed above, their hits included \u201cShe\u2019s My Girl\u201d and \u201cYou Showed Me,\u201d among others.<\/p>\n

\n\tLess successful on the album chart, the band\u2019s lone Top 10 LP was the 1967 compilation disc The Turtles! Golden Hits.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn midlife, Volman returned to college, earning bachelor\u2019s and master\u2019s degrees before teaching music business at several institutions, most notably Belmont University in Nashville. In 2023, he published his memoir, Happy Forever: My Musical Adventures With The Turtles, Frank Zappa, T. Rex, Flo & Eddie, and More.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn 2010, Volman and Kaylan began annual Happy Together tours, often alongside other acts from the \u201960s and \u201970s including Gary Puckett, Mitch Ryder, Mark Lindsay of Paul Revere & The Raiders, Mark Farner of Grand Funk Railroad, Gary Lewis and The Monkees\u2019 Micky Dolenz. Volman continued as part of the tour through summer 2025, pairing with Archies singer Ron Dante, of \u201cSugar Sugar\u201d fame, after Kaylan retired.<\/p>\n

\n\tVolman is survived by his significant other Emily Volman, his ex-wife Pat Volman and their daughters Hallie Volman and Sarina Miller, and his brother Phil Volman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mark Volman, a founding member of the 1960s pop group The Turtles sang on its No. 1 hit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":135433,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[88,84979,216,17204,13441,84980],"class_list":["post-135432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-entertainment","tag-mark-volman","tag-music","tag-novid","tag-obituary","tag-the-turtles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=135432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/135432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/135433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=135432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=135432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=135432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}