Jaki Liebezeit, Can Drummer and Co-Founder, Dead at 78

Jaki Liebezeit, drummer and co-founder of influential krautrock group Can has died at age 78. Brill/Ullstein Bild via Getty

Jaki Liebezeit, drummer and co-founder of the German krautrock pioneers Can, died Sunday at the age of 78.

The band’s official Facebook wrote of Liebezeit’s death, “It is with great sadness we have to announce that Jaki passed away this morning from sudden pneumonia. He fell asleep peacefully, surrounded by his loved ones. We will miss him hugely.”

Liebezeit, as well as Can’s original vocalist Malcolm Mooney and Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore and Steve Shelley, were scheduled to perform a 50th anniversary concert celebrating Can’s legacy in London this April. “So sorry to hear the news of Jaki Liebezeit’s passing,” Shelley wrote Sunday.

A student of the free jazz scene in Dresden, Germany, Liebezeit co-founded Can in…