German music producer Frank Farian – founder of the disco band Boney M – has died at the age of 82, according to his family.
They released a statement on Tuesday via Farian’s agency saying he had passed away at his home in Miami.
Boney M, which formed in 1976, had a string of hit singles including Daddy Cool, Rasputin and Rivers of Babylon.
Farian also went on to found the duo Milli Vanilli, who were involved in a lip-synching controversy.
He was born Franz Reuther in 1941 in Kirn, south-western Germany, and trained as a chef while also pursuing a musical career – first as a singer and then as a producer.
He also worked with the likes of Meat Loaf and Stevie Wonder and is reported to have sold an estimated 800 million records worldwide.
In 1990, Farian was embroiled in a scandal surrounding Milli Vanilli when he confessed they had not sung on their records.
The duo – who scored a clutch of hits in the late 1980s – later had their Grammy Award for best new artist revoked.
In 2022, Farian revealed he had undergone heart surgery and had a pig heart valve inserted, which he said saved his life.
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