Obituaries - Nov. 29, 1999

Fred Ford; Memphis-Based R&B; Saxophonist

Fred Ford, 69, versatile jazz and rhythm and blues saxophonist who recorded with B.B. King and Jerry Lee Lewis. A mainstay of the Memphis music scene, Ford was known for his baritone sax skills and played in hundreds of recording sessions, with such stars as Rufus Thomas, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Charlie Rich and Junior Parker. He began with the Douglass Swingsters Orchestra and the Andrew Chaplin Band in the late 1940s when he was still in high school. Oddly, Ford’s most famous recording featured him barking rather than playing sax. It was the 1952 classic “Hound Dog” by Big Mama Thornton and had few notes for any horns. But the saxophone players and others had been called for the session, so at the end of the song, they all barked like the dog of the title. On Friday in Memphis, of cancer.

Alain Peyrefitte; French Cabinet Minister

Alain Peyrefitte, 74, a former French Cabinet minister and confidant of Gen. Charles de Gaulle. A senior figure in President Jacque Chirac’s Rally for the Republic Party, the right-wing Peyrefitte represented the Provins area, southeast of Paris, as deputy and mayor since 1958. He held numerous cabinet posts dating back to the early ‘60s, including scientific research, culture, environment, administrative reform and planning, and justice. He worked for De Gaulle, first as minister of information and then as education minister, including the time of the student uprising in 1968. An outspoken man, Peyrefitte was the target of an assassination attempt in 1986, when a bomb exploded underneath his car, killing the driver. He wrote a dozen books, including the best-seller “When China Wakes Up,” and was elected to the French Academy in 1977. Since 1983 he had worked as an editorial writer for Le Figaro. Earlier this year, Peyrefitte criticized the NATO bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade and voiced the belief that the allies should cease their military campaign against Yugoslavia. On Saturday in Paris of cancer.