UPDATED 5/12, 10:45 a.m. ET: Naomi Judd died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound her daughter, Ashley Judd, told Good Morning America ,
“Mother used a firearm,” she said, per Deadline. “That’s the piece of information that we are very uncomfortable sharing, but understand that we’re in a position that if we don’t say it, someone else is going to.”
“When we’re talking about mental illness, it’s very important and — to be clear, and to make the distinction between our loved one and the disease,” she added. “It’s very real — and it’s enough to — it lies. It’s savage.”
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Naomi Judd—one half of the mother-daughter country duo The Judds—has died at age 76.
Her daughters Wynona and Ashley Judd announced the tragic news in a statement Saturday, but did not provide details on their mother’s death.
“Today we sisters experienced a tragedy. We lost our beautiful mother to the disease of mental illness,” they told the Associated Press. “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.”
Naomi and Wynona formed The Judds in 1983, and went on to release an EP and six albums over the next eight years. The mother and daughter secured multiple No. 1 singles and a slew of awards, including nine from the Country Music Association, eight from the Academy of Country Music, and five from the Recording Academy. Naomi earned a six Grammy with 1990’s “Love Can Build a Bridge,” which she co-wrote with Paul Overstreet and John Barlow Jarvis.
Naomi announced her retirement from music in the early 1990s, after she was diagnosis with hepatitis C. According to her book, River of Time: My Descent into Depression and How I Emerged with Hope, Naomi was given only three years to live after she received the diagnosis. In 1998, she declared herself “cured” of the disease and embarked on The Last Encore Tour in 2000. Years after the trek, Naomi revealed she had struggled with severe depression and anxiety after The Judds stopped regularly performing.
“What I’ve been through is extreme. My final diagnosis was severe depression,” she told Good Morning America in 2016. “[Fans] see me in rhinestones, you know, with glitter in my hair, that really is who I am. But then I would come home and not leave the house for three weeks, and not get out of my pajamas, and not practice normal hygiene. It was really bad.”
The Judds are to be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on Sunday. Wynona celebrated the honor in an Instagram post earlier this week, writing: “Can’t think of a better way to be welcomed to our new home at the @officialcmhof than by the fans. Looking forward to seeing your sweet faces along the red carpet on Sunday!
It’s unclear if she will attend Sunday’s event.
News of Noami’s death comes just five months before The Judds were set to kick off their U.S. Final Tour with special guest Martina McBride.
