Cleto Escobedo, Jimmy Kimmel’s lifelong friend and band leader on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!,” has died. He was 59.
Kimmel, 57, announced it in an Instagram post on Tuesday.
“Early this morning, we lost a great friend, father, son, musician and man, my longtime bandleader Cleto Escobedo III,” Kimmel wrote.
Jimmy Kimmel and Cleto Escobedo watch the 2024 World Series in LA. Getty Images
Cleto Escobedo attends a gala benefit honoring Jimmy Kimmel in Las Vegas in February. Getty Images“To say that we are heartbroken is an understatement. Cleto and I have been inseparable since I was nine years old. The fact that we got to work together every day is a dream neither of us could ever have imagined would come true,” the talk show host continued. “Cherish your friends and please keep Cleto’s wife, children and parents in your prayers.”
A cause of death was not announced, but Page Six reports that he had complications stemming from a liver transplant.
The Post reached out to Kimmel for comment.
The news comes after “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” abruptly aired a rerun during the Nov. 6 episode due to a “personal matter.”
The scheduled episode was originally supposed to feature “The X-Files” star David Duchovny, “Stranger Things” star Joe Keery and pop singer Madison Beer.
“Due to unforeseen circumstances, @jimmykimmellive needed to reschedule my performance that was originally scheduled to air tonight to a later date,” Beer wrote in a post on Nov. 7.
Cleto Escobedo in Jimmy Kimmel’s Instagram post. Jimmy Kimmel/Instagram
Jimmy Kimmel and Cleto Escobedo pose for a photo on the field before Game 1 of the 2024 World Series in LA. Getty ImagesWith his band, “Cleto and the Cletones,” Escobedo had handled the live music on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” since the ABC talk show premiered in 2003.
His father, Cleto Escobedo Sr., is also part of the band.
During a 2015 interview with ABC7, Kimmel called Escobedo a “child prodigy” and recalled how adamant he was about including him on the nightly program.
Cleto Escobedo performs at the Gibson Amphitheatre in California in 2011. WireImage“I’ll tell you one thing. It had to have my band leader, Cleto,” he told the outlet.
“I was nervous, because I thought they’d say, ‘We don’t want your friend to be the band leader.’ So I took the president of ABC to see him play with his band, and he loved it.”
He added, “Of course I wanted great musicians, but I wanted somebody I had chemistry with. And there’s nobody in my life I have better chemistry with than him.”
