David Bowie

David Robert Jones (8 January 1947 – 10 January 2016), known as David Bowie was an English singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, record producer, painter, and actor. He was a figure in popular music for over five decades, and was considered by critics and other musicians as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s.

Bowie married Mary Angela Barnett on 19 March 1970 at Bromley Register Office in Bromley, London. Their son Duncan, born on 30 May 1971, was at first known as Zowie. Bowie and Angela divorced on 8 February 1980 in Switzerland.

On 24 April 1992, Bowie married the Somali-American model Iman in a private ceremony in Lausanne. The wedding was later solemnised on 6 June in Florence. They had one daughter, Alexandria "Lexi" Zahra Jones, born in August 2000. The couple resided primarily in New York City and London, as well as owning an apartment in Sydney's Elizabeth Bay.

In 2005 he said, "Questioning my spiritual life has always been germane to what I was writing. Always." He added that he was bothered by being "not quite an atheist". In the Esquire interview

"What I've Learned", he stated, "I'm in awe of the universe, but I don't necessarily believe there's an intelligence or agent behind it. I do have a passion for the visual in religious rituals, though, even though they may be completely empty and bereft of substance. The incense is powerful and provocative, whether Buddhist or Catholic."

Bowie showed an interest in Buddhism that began in 1967. He frequently studied in London under the Tibetan Lama Chime Rinpoche before becoming a solo artist. During a 2001 interview, Bowie claimed that "after a few months of study, he told me, 'You don't want to be Buddhist ... You should follow music.'" Bowie later wrote the song "Silly Boy Blue" in tribute to Rinpoche on his 1967 album David Bowie. In the 1960s, he had also studied under Chögyam Trungpa.