{"id":974193,"date":"2019-12-27T10:11:29","date_gmt":"2019-12-27T17:11:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=931660"},"modified":"2019-12-27T10:11:29","modified_gmt":"2019-12-27T17:11:29","slug":"george-michaels-sister-dies-on-third-anniversary-of-singers-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/music-news\/george-michaels-sister-dies-on-third-anniversary-of-singers-death\/","title":{"rendered":"George Michael\u2019s Sister Dies on Third Anniversary of Singer\u2019s Death"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Three years to the day after the death of George Michael<\/a>, the singer\u2019s sister Melanie Panayiotou has died. The siblings\u2019 older sister, Yioda, found Melanie on Wednesday, the evening of Christmas Day, and notified the London ambulance service. Melanie, a hairdresser and makeup artist who shared the responsibilities for Michael\u2019s estate with her family, was 55 at the time of her death.<\/p>\n

The Panayiotous\u2019 family lawyer confirmed Melanie\u2019s death in a statement to the BBC<\/a>. \u201cWe can confirm that very tragically, Melanie has passed away suddenly. We would simply ask that the family\u2019s privacy be respected at this very sad time.\u201d<\/p>\n

London Metropolitan police said Melanie\u2019s death was \u201csudden\u201d and that they were not treating it as suspicious.<\/p>\n

Melanie maintained a close relationship with her brother during his lifetime and would travel with him and cut his hair on the road, according to The Guardian<\/a><\/em>. After his death, he left her \u00a350 million in his will, along with a significant part of his estate. The estate recently worked on the production of the film Last Christmas<\/em>, which drew inspiration from Wham!\u2019s yuletide hit of the same name as well as Michael\u2019s catalog of songs.<\/p>\n

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Michael died on Christmas Day<\/a> 2016 at his Goring-on-Thames home in Oxfordshire, England. A few months later, authorities said he died of natural causes<\/a>, including heart conditions and fatty liver.<\/p>\n

Along with her family, Melanie issued a statement remembering her brother two days before the third anniversary of his death. \u201cIt seems important that his generosity of spirit and natural empathy have touched you in a way that would have him embarrassed; all your kind words are really good to hear, and we know you have always known his true heart,\u201d the statement read. \u201cEveryone has been working so hard to bring you his music, the movie is going to be there to celebrate and remember [George] and his music well into the future \u2026 and we thank everyone whose efforts brought his music to you. We will be swerving the bad and enjoying the good as much as we can this coming year (2019 has been difficult and busy for George\u2019s hardworking team).\u201d<\/p>\n

In a 1985 interview with No. 1 Magazine<\/a><\/em> (via the BBC) Melanie said that her brother hadn\u2019t been like other boys when he was growing up. \u201cFrom what I remember, he was never interested in the kind of things the rest of the fellas were, like football and cars and things like that,\u201d she said. \u201cHe wasn\u2019t an introvert, and I wouldn\u2019t say he was shy like some people have made out. He definitely knew what he wanted to do at an early age.\u201d She also said that when fans would ask for clips of his hair, she told them, \u201cIt goes in the bin like everyone else\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Three years to the day after the death of George Michael, the singer\u2019s sister Melanie Panayiotou has died. The siblings\u2019 older sister, Yioda, found Melanie on Wednesday, the evening of Christmas Day, and notified the London ambulance service. Melanie, a hairdresser and makeup artist who shared the responsibilities for Michael\u2019s estate with her family, was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[76],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-974193","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-27 04:47:56","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KFMU Solar Powered Radio","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=974193"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/974193\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=974193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=974193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kfmu\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=974193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}