Country singer Naomi Judd died at the age of 76 on Saturday. Her cause of death is unknown.
Naomi, who performed with her daughter Wynonna as the country duo, The Judds, was reportedly suffering from mental illness at the time of her death according to her family.
Her famous daughters Wynonna and “Kiss The Girls” star, Ashley Judd, announced their mother’s passing in an Instagram statement on Saturday.
“Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness,” they wrote. “We are shattered. We are navigating profound grief and know that as we loved her, she was loved by her public. We are in unknown territory.”
Judd had self-reportedly suffered from depression, detailing her struggle in her 2016 memoir, River of Time: My Descent into Depression and How I Emerged with Hope. She also was afflicted with Hepatitis, which ended her singing career in 1991.
The Judds scored 14 No.1 hits after they signed with RCA in 1983, including “Mama He’s Crazy,” “Why Not Me,” “Girls Night Out,” and “Grandpa (Tell Me ‘Bout the Good Old Days).
They performed their 1990 ballad “Love Can Build a Bridge” for the at the 2022 CMT Music Awards in Nashville on April 11, for the first time in decades, and were slated to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on Sunday. Naomi’s daughters appeared at the event to honor their late mother.
“My momma loved you so much, and she appreciated your love for her and I’m sorry that she couldn’t hang on until today,” Ashley said while crying. “Your esteem for her and your regard for her really penetrated her heart and it was your affection for her that did keep her going in these last years.”
Wynonna detailed that her mother had passed at 2:20 p.m. on Saturday, and she was surrounded by family.
“I didn’t prepare anything tonight ’cause I knew that mom would probably talk the most,” Wynonna said during her four-minute speech. “I feel so blessed and it’s a very strange dynamic to be this broken and this blessed … but though my heart is broken, I will continue to sing.”
The Judds were slated to go on a ten-city arena tour with country star Martina McBride in September 30, dubbed “The Final Tour.”
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