Jackson Browne is grieving the death of his son, Ethan Browne.
The 77-year-old singer-songwriter shared news of Ethan’s passing in a statement posted to Facebook on Wednesday, Nov. 26. Ethan, an actor and model, was 52.
“It is with deep sorrow that we share that on the morning of November 25, 2025, Ethan Browne, the son of Jackson Browne and Phyllis Major, was found unresponsive in his home and has passed away,” the statement read. “We ask for privacy and respect for the family during this difficult time. No further details are available at this moment.”
Ethan’s mother, Phyllis Major, married the “Running on Empty” musician in 1975. She died by suicide in March 1976 at age 30, when Ethan was still a toddler.
Just weeks after he was born in 1974, Ethan appeared alongside his father on the cover of Rolling Stone, in a now-famous photograph of Browne cradling his infant son and nuzzling his face.
As an adult, Ethan built a career in entertainment and fashion. He appeared in the 2004 Kate Hudson film Raising Helen and modeled in campaigns for designers including Isaac Mizrahi, as noted in producer Mark Ronson’s memoir Night People.
Ronson recalled becoming friends with Ethan when he was living in New York City and sharing an apartment with Simon Rex. He described Ethan as “the real deal — with an angular face and soulful gaze that seemed to reveal his deepest truths, even from a glossy page,” and wrote that Ethan had his mother’s “sharp cheekbones” and his father’s “soulful eyes.” Ethan later founded Spinside Records, an imprint under Browne’s independent label Inside Recordings.
In a 2021 interview with Route Magazine, Browne reflected on how parenting Ethan became central to his life after Major’s death, saying that being a father was his “main focus.”
In a 2022 conversation with Tru Rock Revival, Browne spoke lovingly about watching his son raise his own children.
“Ethan is a great father. He’s a great son, a great man,” Browne said at the time. “I love seeing him with his kids. When I see him in his movies, modeling, with his daughter, and being such a great dad, it makes me very proud. It makes me feel I’ve done something really right in my life.”
Browne is also father to another son, Ryan, 43, whom he shares with his ex-wife Lynne Sweeney.
