Remembering Dan Seals
See "We are One," Dan Seals' half-hour introductory film about the Baha'i Faith based on his hit song by the same name.
Dan Seals, a much-loved pop and country music star who lent his voice and energy to the praise of Baha'u'llah internationally for over four decades, passed away on March 25, 2009, in Nashville, Tennessee after several years’ battle with lymphoma. He was 61.
His musical career brought him to the top of the pop and country charts, garnering two Country Music Association awards in the process. Even as such recordings as “Nights Are Forever,” “Love Is the Answer” (both in partnership with John Coley), “Meet Me in Montana” and “Bop” were selling by the millions, Dan was teaching the Baha'i Faith through such Baha'i-themed songs as “The Greatest Name,” “The Prisoner” and “We Are One.”
“He leaves behind thousands of fans, countless friends and a loving family,” read a statement posted on the Web site for Seals and Seals on March 26. “He will forever be remembered for his gentle smile, easy going demeanor, his enduring faith and endless generosity.
”Danny Wayland Seals was born in McCamey, Texas, to a musical family; he played string bass in a family band as early as age 4. His older brother Jim got his big break in the music business in the 1960s, with the Champs and Glen Campbell’s band. Starting in high school in Dallas, Dan partnered with Coley in a series of musical ventures, including a psychedelic rock band with a minor hit.
In 1969, the duo moved to California to advance their career. It was around this time that his brother and Dash Crofts began recording as Seals and Crofts and teaching the Faith in performance and firesides. Dan became a member of the Baha'i Faith that year. For a few years, the smooth-voiced duo England Dan and John Ford Coley had solid followings in Japan and Europe, smaller in North America.
They took opportunities to teach the Faith in places they traveled to perform. This activity ranged more widely after they entered the world of Gold Record awards and stadium concerts from 1976–1980.
More sustained career success came when Dan repositioned himself as a solo country singer based in the Nashville, Tennessee, area. Of his dozens of singles in the 1980s and 1990s, 11 reached No. 1 on the Billboard magazine country chart. He received Country Music Awards for “Bop” and “Meet Me in Montana,” a duet with Marie Osmond.
The international scope of his teaching of the Faith expanded in the 1990s, often in his travels as a soloist with the Voices of Baha choir. That Baha'i service ranged from Thailand and India to Canada to a dozen European countries from the United Kingdom to Slovakia.
Back home, he augmented his personal teaching and public talks by contributing to multimedia proclamation materials, including the 1993 Live Unity project with other Baha'i musicians, and the 2000 video We Are One, in which he and his son Jesse set out the basic teachings of the Faith.
He supported many Baha'i gatherings over the years with his performances, including youth conferences in 1988 in Indiana and in 1995 in Arizona; the Second Baha'i World Congress in 1992 in New York; and Southern Regional Conferences in 2000 and 2003 in Tennessee.
Though he battled cancer in the past few years, Dan joined his brother Jim for a number of performances as Seals and Seals, and they recorded several songs together.
He had a lifelong love of fly fishing, and made avocations of fly-tying and building bamboo rods.
Dan Seals is survived by his wife, Andrea; a daughter, Holly; three sons, Jimmy, Jeremy and Jesse; his mother, Susan; a sister, Renee Byars-Staley; and two brothers, James and Eddie.
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Reprinted with permission from the Baha'is of the United States
(see U.S. Baha'i News)