Lean on Me and Lovely Day singer dies of heart complications, according to a family statement

• Alexis Petridis on Bill Withers, the brilliant folk-soul star who said it all with time to spare

Bill Withers, the influential US soul singer who wrote Lean on Me, Ain’t No Sunshine and Lovely Day has died aged 81 of heart complications, according to a statement from his family.

Withers wrote and recorded several other major hits including Use Me and Just the Two of Us, before retiring in the mid-1980s and staying out of the public eye.