Sly Stone, Whose Epic Band Was Born In Ingleside, Dies At 82

Funk and psychedelic music icon and frontman of Sly and the Family Stone, Sylvester “Sly Stone” Stewart, died at the age of 82.

Stone’s publicist, Carleen Donovan, announced on Monday that Stone had passed in Los Angeles surrounded by family after contending with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other ailments. He was born on March 15, 1943, in Denton, Texas, and his family eventually moved to Vallejo, Calif.

Though Stone is commonly known for his band Sly and the Family Stone and their hits “Everyday People,” “Family Affair” and “Dance to the Music,” among others, he was also known for being a pillar in the music scene, elevating the funk genre with a combination of soul, psychedelic rock, Latin and gospel tones and pushing the social norms for what a band could look like, giving every race and gender a chance to be seen as equals on and off the stage.

Around the time of the band’s inception in the mid-1960s, Stone and his fellow musicians, who went by the name The Stoners at the time and included several of his siblings, spent their days practicing out of 700 Urbano Dr. in Ingleside Terraces.

Last year, Stone released an autobiography with help from American novelist Ben Greenman titled “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin): A Memoir” that reveals more about that time. Stone recounts helping his parents buy 700 Urbano Dr., where he had a studio in the basement and a room.

“You could walk up to Ocean Avenue for anything you wanted [...],” Stone wrote.

Although Stone eventually moved to Haight Street during this period, he wrote that Sly and Family Stone had come together in the house’s basement, where they rehearsed.

The band was discovered by a producer from Columbia Records and released its first album, “A Whole New Thing,” in 1967. They also played at multiple venues across the Bay Area, including the Little Bo Beep in the Excelsior, The Fillmore with The Grateful Dead in the Fillmore and the Winchester Cathedral in Redwood City.

Community members in 2020 shared memories of the band’s time on Urbano Drive on a post in the San Francisco Remembered Facebook group, detailing how they could hear their music throughout the neighborhood and would watch a few practices. The Ingleside Light’s weekly feature Everyday People about an individual in the neighborhood was named in homage to Stone.

Stone lived a music-filled life even from a young age, including singing on stage at a Sam Cooke show at age 4 and mastering several instruments and recording a gospel song with his siblings by age 11. He also played at Woodstock with his band in 1969, which was deemed a legendary performance by attendees and used his music to reflect on the world’s current political climate in the 1970s.

Although he stepped away from the limelight in the 1980s due to drug addiction, he made several public appearances and was honored over the decades, including being inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1993 and receiving a lifetime achievement award from The Grammys in 2017.

American drummer and record producer Questlove also premiered the documentary “Sly Lives!” at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2025. Stone had recently completed a screenplay about his life story, according to a news report.

Stone is survived by his daughters, Novena Carmel and Sylvette Robinson and his son, Sylvester Stewart Jr. and his siblings, Freddie Stone, Rose Stone and Vet Stone.