Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame inductee Dave ‘Baby’ Cortez was born David Cortez Clowney in Detroit in 1938. Encouraged to take up piano by his father, he made his first recording in the Motor City as a singer/pianist with the Five Pearls doo wop group in 1954. After relocating to New York, he began recording under the stage name Dave ‘Baby’ Cortez in 1958 on the Okeh label.
After signing with Clock Records, small New York label, Cortez used a Hammond B-C3 electric organ in the studio to transform the song he was recording into an exuberant instrumental. Titled “The Happy Organ,” it was released in 1959, and it surprised everyone when it topped the Billboard Hot 100 on May 11th. It made Cortez the first Michigan-born artist to score a # 1 instrumental hit, and he was also the first to use a Hammond B-C3 as the lead instrument on a rock and roll recording. 
Dave 'Baby' Cortez
Several minor hits followed, but his only other significant instrumental recording was “Rinky Dink,” which peaked at # 10 after being released on Chess Records in 1962.
For the next decade or so, Cortez recorded some other charting hits on a variety of labels but the golden era of instrumentals had come to an end. Apparently disillusioned with the music business, Cortez stepped away from recording for the next 37 years.
Things changed when Miriam Linna of Norton Records tracked him down in 2009, hoping to reissue some of his records. She convinced him to take another stab at recording, and two years later, Norton released the album “Dave ‘Baby’ Cortez with Lonnie Youngblood and His Bloodhounds.” That same year, Cortez performed a joyous set at the Norton Records’ 25th anniversary concert in Brooklyn.
Miriam Linna lost contact with Cortez after the performance, but in 2025 he became a news story again after she mentioned him on her internet radio show, Crashing the Party. A 15-year-old music historian from Australia named Liam Waldon heard the episode and decided to try to find Cortez for an interview.
After a bit of online digging, Waldon discovered that Cortez had died and that his body remained unclaimed. According to city records, David Cortez Clowney died on May 31, 2022, at his home on Westchester Avenue in the Bronx. No cause of death was given. He was 83. 
Hart Island
He had lived as a recluse there for over a decade without any of his neighbors knowing that he was a famous musician or that he had a family. Because his body was unclaimed, it took almost four months before Cortez was finally laid to rest in Plot 434 on Hart Island, the potter’s field off the Bronx shoreline, where some one million bodies are buried in unmarked graves.
His daughter Taryn Sheffield learned of his death only after BMI, the music rights organization, contacted the family while looking for his next of kin. Sheffield said in an interview that she had not heard from him since 2009. “He’s been a recluse for many, many years,” she said. “The music business wasn’t very kind to him, and he was bitter.” As for her lack of communication with her father, she said that there was no bad blood between them, and that life just got in the way. “I’m 60 years-old, and I’ve got 10 grandchildren,” she said. “I really don’t have the time to move back.”
It was a very strange ending for one of Michigan's legendary artists, one whose name is known around the world for his hit recordings. As a result of the unusual circumstances surrounding his later life and passing, Dave 'Baby' Cortez's lengthy obituary wasn't published in the New York Times until three years after his death.
"The Happy Organ" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tcpelLe8oHo
"Rinky Dink" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXrI4CYQnkQ
