Wayne Osmond, whose baritone voice helped create the tight, four-part harmonies of the Osmond Brothers, has died at at the age of 73.
“Wayne Osmond, beloved husband and father, passed away peacefully last night surrounded by his loving wife and five children,” his family shared in a statement. “His legacy of faith, music, love, and laughter have influenced the lives of many people around the world. He would want everyone to know that the gospel of Jesus Christ is true, that families are forever, and that banana splits are the best dessert. We love him and will miss him dearly.”
Donny Osmond shared a tribute to his older brother on Thursday, noting that the cause of death was a stroke.
“My dear brother Wayne passed away peacefully last night from a stroke. I’m so grateful that I had the opportunity to visit him in the hospital before he passed,” Osmond shared on Instagram. “Wayne brought so much light, laughter, and love to everyone who knew him, especially me. He was the ultimate optimist and was loved by everyone. I’m sure I speak on behalf of every one of us siblings when I state that we were fortunate to have Wayne as a brother. Even though we are separated in this mortal life, I know that by the grace and resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ, we will have the opportunity to be with Wayne for eternity. I love you, Wayne. Your brother forever, Donny.”
The rise of the Osmond Brothers
Long before there was Donny and Marie, or the superstardom of The Osmonds in the 1970s — when the brothers performed on the same stage as Elvis at The Hilton in Las Vegas — there were the Osmond Brothers, a barbershop quartet-style act that had its unofficial start with a performance of “Oh Dear Lord in Heaven” for their Latter-day Saint church congregation in Ogden, Utah, as the Deseret News reported in 2018.
Wayne Osmond was 6.
The string of compliments that came from that performance led parents George and Olive Osmond to think their sons could perhaps help pay for hearing aids for their two oldest children, Tom and Virl. So George Osmond started scheduling performances for his sons, while Olive Osmond worked with them on their harmonies at home.
The Osmond Brothers performed for family and church groups and parties in and around Ogden. Eventually, they got a chance to travel to Los Angeles and audition for “The Lawrence Welk Show” — and then got stood up by Welk, per the Deseret News.
But the trip wasn’t completely in vain. Before returning home, the brothers visited Disneyland, where they gathered a crowd and stopped traffic with their barbershop act. They returned to Disneyland the following year with a performance that caught the eye of Andy Williams’ father.
About five years after their performance in church, the Osmond Brothers were making their debut on “The Andy Williams Show.”
And that was just the beginning.
“We owe them everything,” Marie Osmond previously told the Deseret News. “My brothers are legendary. Go listen to their harmony (from the old days), it’s mind-boggling. I have spent a lifetime studying and learning singing, but I promise you I have never heard anybody sing like my four original brothers.
“My brothers are my heroes,” she continued. “Everything I have learned from a professional standpoint, from having honesty and integrity and doing what’s right, I learned from them. These are strong men, and I love them.”
A man of faith
Throughout his life — even amid the pressures of the entertainment industry that at one point brought severe financial woes upon the Osmonds — Wayne Osmond clung to his faith as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
The financial setback, when they lost millions of dollars that led the original Osmond Brothers to return to county fairs and corporate retreats to help pay off their debts, “actually made me love my Heavenly Father more because it made me realize money doesn’t do anything; it means nothing,” Wayne Osmond previously told the Deseret News.
Wayne Osmond maintained his values, inspired by his faith, on and off stage.
“You don’t really have those feelings of ‘Well, I’m gonna start swearin’ and drinkin’ Jack Daniels,’” he told the Deseret News during a 2004 interview. “You just don’t even think of going there, basically. It’s just a different value system, that’s all.”
“We’re Latter-day Saints, and we have a very high moral and ethical code that we live by. ... It’s not something that’s forced upon us,” he continued. “But when you have certain values that you really like, and you like being part of that organization, then it behooves you to kind of live up to those standards.”
‘I’ve had a wonderful life’
The fourth of the nine Osmond siblings, and the second-oldest in the Osmond Brothers, Wayne Osmond suffered a few health setbacks over the years.
In 1997, at the age of 46, he underwent surgery for a brain tumor. The treatment for the cancer resulted in an almost total loss of hearing, as the Deseret News reported.
“It’s funny, and really ironic,” Osmond said in 2018. “But I had the best ears in our family. Whenever my brothers wanted the instruments tuned I was the one they turned to.”
In 2012, Osmond had a major stroke.
Osmond ended up retiring from the music industry, but did reunite with brothers Alan, Merrill and Jay to serenade their one and only sister, Marie Osmond, for her 60th birthday in 2019.
And he still plays a role of sorts onstage in Vegas, where his younger brother, Donny Osmond, is performing a solo residency.
Throughout his production at Harrah’s, Donny Osmond frequently features tributes to his brothers, starting with “The Andy Williams Show” and working his way up to The Osmonds’ stardom and their first No. 1 hit, “One Bad Apple” — originally meant for the Jackson 5.
He includes a montage of clips in his show, including one that features the Osmonds dancing alongside their oldest brothers, Tom and Virl, on “The Andy Williams Show.”
As he shows the clip, Donny Osmond speaks with fondness for all of his older brothers, and notes how Tom and Virl danced in perfect synchronization with their siblings despite their severe hearing loss.
“I’ve had a wonderful life,” Wayne Osmond previously told the Deseret News. “And you know, being able to hear is not all that it’s cracked up to be, it really isn’t. My favorite thing now is to take care of my yard. I turn my hearing aids off, deaf as a doorknob, tune everything out, it’s really joyful.”