Cory Wells 1941-2015

Cory Wells (born Emil Lewandowski; February 2, 1941 - October 20, 2015) was an American singer, best known as one of the three lead vocalists in the band Three Dog Night.
Wells came from a musical family and began playing in Buffalo-area bands in his teens. His father, who was married to someone else, died when Cory was a small child, leaving his mother to struggle financially until she eventually remarried. She gave Cory her maiden last name so not to implicate his natural father, although Cory did eventually change his last name to Wells (which is a shortened version of his birth father's last name, Wellsley). His full stage name "Cory Wells" was suggested by The Enemies' first manager, Gene Jacobs who had a son named Cory. Having survived childhood in a rough, racially polarized neighborhood and an even more brutal home environment fueled by an abusive stepfather, this according to manager Joel Cohen's band biography, Three Dog Night And Me, before forming The Enemies, Wells joined the United States Air Force directly out of high school. While in the Air Force, he formed a band of interracial musical performers, inspired by his boyhood love of a similar popular band called The Del-Vikings, who had a national hit with the doo-wop song, "Come Go with Me." Following his military tour of duty, Wells returned to Buffalo and was asked to join a band named the Vibratos. It was here that he was heard by Gene Jacobs, brother-in-law to the Vibratos guitar player, Mike Lustan, who suggested to him if he was serious about making it in music that he travel to California with the band. They changed the name to "The Enemys"
and soon began working all the clubs in the LA area, San Diego, Las Vegas and Sacramento. After being the house band at the Whisky a Go Go for a year, Wells was asked to tour with Sonny and Cher. It was on that tour where he met Danny Hutton & together they formed Three Dog Night in 1968. When they looked for a third singer, they found him in Chuck Negron, whom Hutton had met at a Hollywood party. Three Dog Night became one of the most successful bands of the late 1960s and early 1970s. After Three Dog Night broke up in 1976, Wells tried a solo career, recording the album Touch Me for A&M Records in 1978. Wells helped re-launch Three Dog Night in the mid-1980s. A falling out with Negron left Hutton and Wells with the name "Three Dog Night" as an entity, under which they had performed successfully until recently and toured every year. Unlike many other rock musicians of the day, Wells was able to abstain from serious drug and alcohol problems, nor did he squander his earnings on the lavish life style of a successful rock star, choosing to live a somewhat more moderate existence.
Wells died on October 20, 2015 at his home in Dunkirk, New York.
He was 74.