{"id":29397,"date":"2026-06-19T07:30:59","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T07:30:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/?p=29397"},"modified":"2026-06-19T07:30:59","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T07:30:59","slug":"chicago-co-founder-dies-at-81","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/?p=29397","title":{"rendered":"Chicago Co-Founder Dies at 81"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ad_ph\">\n<p data-start=\"24\" data-end=\"181\"><span class=\"hover:entity-accent entity-underline inline cursor-pointer align-baseline\"><span class=\"whitespace-normal\">Walter Parazaider<\/span><\/span>, the founding saxophonist and flutist of legendary rock band <span class=\"hover:entity-accent entity-underline inline cursor-pointer align-baseline\"><span class=\"whitespace-normal\">Chicago<\/span><\/span>, has died at age 81.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"183\" data-end=\"379\">Parazaider passed away on June 17 while in hospice care after a six-year battle with Alzheimer\u2019s disease. His wife, JacLynn, remembered their 59 years of marriage, saying he \u201cput up a good fight.\u201d<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"381\" data-end=\"662\">As one of Chicago\u2019s original members, Parazaider helped create the band\u2019s signature horn-driven sound and played on classics including <em data-start=\"516\" data-end=\"530\">25 or 6 to 4<\/em>, <em data-start=\"532\" data-end=\"554\">Saturday in the Park<\/em>, <em data-start=\"556\" data-end=\"577\">If You Leave Me Now<\/em>, and <em data-start=\"583\" data-end=\"607\">You\u2019re the Inspiration<\/em>. He retired from touring in 2017 due to health issues.<\/p>\n<p data-start=\"664\" data-end=\"883\">Chicago paid tribute to the musician, crediting him with the vision that brought the band together and helped launch one of the most successful groups in rock history. He is survived by his wife and their two daughters.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Ftris.imboden%2Fposts%2Fpfbid0ZfpP1WetcnAeu2oddUD1Qoa7v7y6RAg3dvo5C61EstxyUG9y8y6WapE1PoQqD2DPl&amp;show_text=true&amp;width=500\" width=\"500\" height=\"705\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-6m5RwlnMvk?si=Sw1CPmNcOvFo_vge\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Walter Parazaider, the founding saxophonist and flutist of legendary rock band Chicago, has died at age 81. Parazaider passed away on June 17 while in hospice care after a six-year battle with Alzheimer\u2019s disease. His wife, JacLynn, remembered their 59 years of marriage, saying he \u201cput up a good fight.\u201d As one of Chicago\u2019s original&#8230;<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link-wrap\"><a href=\"https:\/\/albotips.com\/?p=29397\" class=\"more-link\">Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &ldquo;Chicago Co-Founder Dies at 81&rdquo;<\/span> &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29398,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29397"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29397\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29399,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29397\/revisions\/29399"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29398"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/albotips.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}