Here are some of 2023’s most notable deaths:

January 7: Russell Banks, 82, US novelist who charted the lives of marginalised people

January 10: Jeff Beck, 78, British guitar virtuoso who rose to rock and roll fame with 1960s group the Yardbirds

January 12: Lisa Marie Presley, 54, singer-songwriter and only child of Elvis Presley, of a bowel condition caused by weight loss surgery

January 16: Gina Lollobrigida, 95, Italian film diva, one of the last icons of Golden Age Hollywood

January 18: David Crosby, 81, American folk-rock pioneer

February 3: Paco Rabanne, 88, Spanish fashion designer famed for his eccentric designs and fragrances

February 8: Burt Bacharach, 94, legendary pop composer of Walk on By and Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head

February 15: Raquel Welch, 82, US actress and global sex symbol who famously donned a fur bikini in a 1960s caveman epic

March 3: Kenzaburo Oe, 88, Nobel-winning Japanese novelist

March 28: Ryuichi Sakamoto, 71, Japanese composer who pioneered electronic music

April 13: Mary Quant, 93, rule-breaking British fashion designer and pioneer of the miniskirt

April 19: Moonbin, 25, K-Pop megastar and member of boy band Astro, found dead at his home in an apparent suicide

April 22: Barry Humphries, aka Dame Edna Everage, 89, Australian comedian who invented the bespectacled, lilac-haired parody of a suburban housewife

April 25: Harry Belafonte, 96, superstar American musician and activist

April 27: Jerry Springer, 79, popular US talk show host, whose rowdy programme symbolised low-brow TV

May 19: Martin Amis, 73, leading voice in modern British fiction

May 24: Tina Turner, 83, US rock icon famed for her electrifying stage presence

June 5: Astrud Gilberto, 83, Brazilian Girl from Ipanema singer

June 13: Cormac McCarthy, 89, titan of American fiction with novels including The Road

June 16: Jane Birkin, 76, British-born singer and actress famous for her relationship with French singer-songwriter Serge Gainsbourg

June 21: Tony Bennett, 96, last of the classic American crooners

June 26: Sinead O’Connor, 56, iconoclastic Irish pop singer, best known for her 1990 global hit Nothing Compares 2 U

August 7: William Friedkin, 87, US director of The Exorcist and The French Connection

August 9: Sixto Rodriguez, 81, cult American singer-songwriter, the subject of the Oscar-winning documentary Searching for Sugar Man

September 15: Fernando Botero, 91, Colombian sculptor famous for his voluptuous forms

September 27: Michael gambon, 82, British actor, played Albus Dumbledore in many “Harry Potter” films

October 13 Louise Gluck, 80, American poet, winner of Nobel and Pulitzer prizes

October 28: Matthew Perry, 54, US star who played Chandler Bing in hit sitcom Friends after a long battle with addiction

November 30: Shane Macgowan, 65, Irish singer-songwriter and booze-fuelled bard who fronted Celtic folk-punk band The Pogues

December 8: Ryan O’Neal, 82, US actor and heart-throb of Love Story and Barry Lyndon fame

December 11: Bulelwa Mkutukana aka Zahara, 36, South African Afro-pop sensation, who suffered from liver damage due to alcoholism

December 27: Lee Sun-Kyun, 48, South Korean actor best known for his role in the Oscar-winning film Parasite, found dead in Seoul

– AFP