Plagiarism was for her a deliberate literary act: she openly pillaged work ranging from Defoe and Robert Louis Stevenson to Harold Robbins and Erica Jong.She was born in 1944 in New York into a Jewish family in the glove business. In recent years she was interested in the multimedia possibilities for fiction – she began with a CD she made with the Mekons of her novel Pussy, King of the Pirates.Fascinated by language and its relation to power and to the body, she used violent sexual imagery, repetition and other people’s plots to explore concepts of narrative. The punk turned post-modernist Kathy Acker was a controversial figure on the literary scene with her bike-girl/bad girl image and her graphic writing about sex and violence, menstruation and incest, suicide and S & M.
The novelist as performance artist, the author of Blood and Guts in High School (1984) wrote all her work with public presentation in mind. Kathy Lehman, writer and performance artist: born New York April 1944; married first Robert Acker (marriage dissolved), secondly Peter Gordon (marriage dissolved); died London 29 November 1997. For 15 years, he also played with his own jazz trio and quintet, releasing several instrumental albums, and penned a regular column for Guitar Player magazine, which tagged him “the most recorded guitarist in history”.Equally at ease with a Fender, a Gibson, a Yamaha or an Ovation, and proficient on the mandolin, balalaika and the lute, Tommy Tedesco was the king of studio musicians.- Pierre Perrone.

Yet there was a serious side to him, and he found time to teach aspiring guitarists at the Musicians Institute in Hollywood and to write guitar manuals. I look back and now I’m really impressed with the records I played on.Alongside his many pop recordings, Tedesco’s television work included such characteristic themes as the fuzzy “Bonanza” and “Batman” (the Neal Hefti tune covered by everyone from the Who to the Kinks via the Jam), the twangy “Green Acres”, “Mash”, and “Charlie’s Angels”, while his evocative guitar work was also used to great effect on the soundtracks of feature films such as Love Story (1970), The Deer Hunter (1978), The Godfather (1972) and Field of Dreams (1989).Something of a raconteur and a prankster, Tedesco once arrived at a Frank Zappa session (for the Lumpy Gravy album) wearing a Boy Scout uniform. Back then, when I heard the records I played on, I would have said: that’s terrible Now when I hear them, I say: that’s nice. I never knew what was gonna happen,” Tedesco said later.I’m proud to have been involved withall the people I worked with. He took part in recordings by the Monkees, the Association, the Fifth Dimension, the Mamas and the Papas, Laura Nyro, Barbra Streisand, the Partridge Family, Stephen Bishop and Linda Ronstadt.”My job as a guitar player was to do the best I could. His playing was featured on Sixties hits such as “Eve of Destruction” by Barry McGuire, “MacArthur Park” by Richard Harris, “Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves” by Cher and “Strangers in the Night” by Frank Sinatra.

The guitarist and his cronies – nicknamed “The Wrecking Crew” – helped fashion “He’s a Rebel”, “Da Doo Ron Ron” and “Then He Kissed Me” by the Crystals as well as “Be My Baby” by the Ronettes and “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling”, a transatlantic No 1 by the Righteous Brothers.Tedesco was also a session regular with the Beach Boys, impersonating Chuck Berry’s guitar licks for hits like “Surfin’ USA” and “Fun Fun Fun” and greatly contributing to their classic album Pet Sounds (1967). As a teenager, he sneaked into Niagara Falls clubs to perform. He moved to Los Angeles in the early Fifties and, little by little, became one of the most reliable session guitarists, always on call for the arranger Nelson Riddle and the jazz singer Mel Torme.Tedesco was drafted by the producer Phil Spector, who was perfecting his “Wall of Sound” style at Gold Star studios. Over the course of a 35-year career, his guitar work was featured on thousands of recordings from movie and television soundtracks to classic Sixties and Seventies recordings, with everyone from Frank Sinatra to Frank Zappa via Elvis Presley, Dean Martin, Ella Fitzgerald and Herb Alpert.
Born in Niagara Falls, the son of an insurance salesman, Tedesco was something of a precocious child and started playing the guitar when he was six. “Session call Number One” is a term used in the record industry to define the consummate versatility and efficiency of a particular instrumentalist. Tommy Tedesco had earned that stellar accolade in Los Angeles, that most competitive of music cities. It would, however, be wrong to reach a final conclusion on the present state of the documentary evidence, and in those circumstances it would be wrong to strike out the plaintiff’s claim on public policy grounds.- Kate O’Hanlon, Barrister.

Tommy Tedesco, guitarist: born Niagara Falls, New York 1930; married (three sons, one daughter); died Northridge, California 10 November 1997. On the other hand, it might be established that she had made statements in two separate contexts, some being directed to her complaints about the plaintiff, and some being in answer to enquiries by the police concerning the plaintiff’s application for parole. It seemed quite clear from a consideration of the history of the Parole Board and its present constitution and functions that its proceedings could not be regarded as part of the proceedings of a court of law. The absolute privilege which attached to such proceedings would not therefore apply.The primary submission made on behalf of the defendant was, however, that the statements she had made to the police had been made in connection with possible criminal proceedings against the plaintiff, and were therefore entitled to immunity on the principle recognised and explained in Taylor v Director of the Serious Fraud Office (unreported, 22 July 1997).It might be that when the matter was fully investigated it would be found that all the relevant statements made by the defendant to the police related to a possible offence by the plaintiff. There was an issue to be tried which could not be resolved by means of affidavit evidence alone.The court had also invited submissions as to whether the action should be struck out on grounds of public policy. The authorities, he claimed, treated him as though he had made up a completely fictitious account of the relationship between himself and the defendant and, he contended, unless he could establish the true position by means of the present proceedings, he had no prospect of correcting that misconception and therefore no realistic prospect of obtaining parole.The plaintiff’s action faced formidable difficulties, but the defendant had not demonstrated that it was bound to fail, and it would not be right to reject as unfounded the plaintiff’s assertion that he had brought the proceedings to establish the truth and clear his name.