Mike Porcaro Net Worth

What Was Mike Porcaro's Net Worth?

Mike Porcaro was an American bass player who had a net worth of $20 million at the time of his death in 2015. Mike Porcaro was best known for his work with the band Toto. Porcaro played with the band from 1982 to 2007. Toto is best known for their Top 5 hit singles "Rosanna," "Hold the Line," and "Africa". They have released 14 studio albums and have sold more than 35 million albums. Their most successful album, 1982's "Toto IV," was certified Platinum or higher in seven countries and won three Grammy Awards. Toto was inducted into the Musicians Hall of Fame and Museum in 2009. Mike released the solo album "Brotherly Love" in 2011.

Mike's brothers, Jeff and Steve Porcaro, have also been part of Toto as a drummer and keyboardist, respectively. Their father was jazz drummer and percussionist Joe Porcaro. Mike was a session bass player before joining Toto. In 2007, he stopped performing due to numbness in his fingers which made it difficult to play bass. He announced that he was suffering from Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease) in 2010, and in 2012, it was reported that he was in a wheelchair due to the disease. Mike Porcaro passed away in his sleep on March 15, 2015, at the age of 59.

Early Life

Mike Porcaro was born Michael Joseph Porcaro on May 29, 1955, in South Windsor, Connecticut. He was the son of jazz drummer Joe Porcaro, who taught Mike and his brothers, Steve and Jeff, how to play drums each weekend at his drum shop. Though Jeff ended up being the drummer of Toto, he said that Mike was actually a better drummer than him during their youth. Mike eventually switched to bass, and Steve began playing piano. Porcaro had Italian ancestry, and he practiced the Baháʼí Faith.

Career

Porcaro was in a few bands in high school, and one of them included his brother Jeff Porcaro and some of his future Toto bandmates. In the '70s, Mike was a session bass player for several bands and musicians before joining Toto in 1982 as a replacement for bassist David Hungate. He played cello on the 1982 album "Toto IV," then he played bass on their subsequent albums and began appearing in their music videos. Porcaro stayed with Toto until 2007, and he released the solo album "Brotherly Love" in 2011. Mike also toured with Seals and Crofts, Michael Franks, Boz Scaggs, and Larry Carlton, and he appeared in Scaggs' music video for "JoJo." Peter Iwers, the bass player for the Swedish heavy metal band In Flames, has said that his style of playing was influenced by Porcaro.

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Personal Life and Death

Mike married his wife, Cheryl, in 1987, and they welcomed three children together. In 2007, Porcaro had to stop performing with Toto due to weakness in his fingers. The band replaced him with Leland Sklar for the rest of the tour, then they disbanded in 2008. In early 2010, Toto announced that Mike had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and that the band would be reuniting for a short tour in support of him. In September 2012, Toto keyboardist David Paich revealed in "Classic Rock" magazine that Porcaro was "hanging in there" and was confined to a wheelchair. He added, "He's been going downhill for the last three years. It's a very slow degenerative process. He can't walk and can't play, which is a total heartbreaking drag." On March 15, 2015, Mike passed away at the age of 59 at his Los Angeles home. He was laid to rest at L.A.'s Forest Lawn Memorial Park. His brother Jeff died in 1992. In 2018, Mike and Jeff posthumously appeared on two Toto albums on which the band used archived recordings of them from the '80s.

Awards

Toto has earned 11 Grammy nominations. In 1983, they won for Album of the Year and Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical for "Toto IV" and Record of the Year, Best Vocal Arrangement for Two or More Voices, and Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocal(s) for their hit song "Rosanna." In 1986, Toto was honored with a Crystal Globe award for selling over five million records outside of the U.S.

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