URIAH HEEP Singer BERNIE SHAW’s Wife RADKA Dies After ‘Serious Illness’

According to the Czech tabloid Blesk, Radka Shaw, the wife of URIAH HEEP frontman Bernie Shaw, passed away on August 17 after a “serious illness.” She was only 47 years old.

The 67-year-old Canadian singer and his wife, who was of Czech descent, had been together since 2005 and they had two children together, daughter Madeleine (17) and son Valentýn (12).

Radka’s funeral will be held on September 2 in her original hometown of Uherský Brod, Czech Republic.

In announcing Radka’s death, her family included the following quote from Abraham Lincoln: “Die when I may, I want it said by those who knew me best that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow.”

Bernie relocated to the U.K. in the late 1970s and went on to record with such bands as GRAND PRIX, PRAYING MANTIS and STRATUS before joining URIAH HEEP at the end of 1986. He has appeared on the band’s nine studio albums since 1989, as well as numerous live albums.

In a 2011 interview with the Phoenix New Times, Shaw said that 1973’s “Sweet Freedom” was “probably” his favorite URIAH HEEP album from before he joined the band. “That was the first LP that I’d heard and the band I was playing with at the time included ‘Stealin” in our live set,” he explained. “I was a fan of any melodic rock at the time of which HEEP were very much a part of.”