Cleto Escobedo, III, sax player and bandleader for Jimmy Kimmel Live!, died on Nov. 11. He was 59. Escobedo and Kimmel had been childhood friends in Las Vegas, and Cleto and the Cletones played on Jimmy Kimmel Live! since its debut in 2003. The son of musician Cleto Escobedo, Jr., Cleto III toured with Paula Abdul and several other artists, and joined Kimmel’s show with his father’s band, which he inherited. Escobedo joined a 2017 suit trying to get musicians compensated for just the kind of YouTube link I offer below: “Other performers are all paid when Jimmy Kimmel Live! streams on YouTube or other online outlets,” he said, “yet musicians are paid nothing. Musicians just want to be compensated for our likeness and our music. I love Jimmy, the producers, and everyone we work with. We just need to make sure the networks treat us and ALL of our colleagues fairly.”
Cleto Escobedo, III, “If You Had A Clue” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MyvYJxxmsYk&list=RDMyvYJxxmsYk&start_radio=1
