Jefferson Airplane co-founder Marty Balin – Dead at 76

Jefferson Airplane co-founder Marty Balin has died of unknown causes at the age of 76. Spokesman Ryan Romenesko told the Los Angeles Times that Balin was on the way to a hospital in Tampa, Florida on Thursday when he faltered.

Balin had recently filed a lawsuit after being left “totally disabled” after a stay at a New York City medical facility, where he’d been admitted for emergency open-heart surgery. Balin alleged that the staff at Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital botched his recovery from open-heart surgery in 2016, according to the New York Post. Balin was left, the suit said, without his vocal chords, half of his tongue, the mobility of his left hand and without his left thumb.

Balin is survived by his wife Susan, daughters Jennifer Edwards and Delaney Balin, and stepdaughters Rebekah Geier and Moriah Geier. “Marty and I shared the deepest of love. He often called it nirvana, and it was,” Susan said in an official statement. “But really, we were all touched by his love. His presence will be within my entire being forever.”

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