In the early hours of the final day of August 1970, Jimi Hendrix delivered what would become one of his most legendary performances.

A crowd estimated to number hundreds of thousands of people watched in awe as the American guitarist, singer and songwriter wowed them at the Isle of Wight Festival.

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Hendrix was the biggest name – and the biggest influence – in popular music. It would be his last show in England.

Less than three weeks later, rock was in mourning.

Hendrix died 51 years ago today, on 18 September, 1970. His career spanned just four years, but in that time he changed music forever.

Anyone who picked up a guitar after hearing songs like Purple Haze, Hey Joe, The Wind Cries Mary, Voodoo Child (Slight Return), Crosstown Traffic and Foxy Lady owes something to Hendrix.

Those songs, and the guitar sound Hendrix created, have stood the test of time. His influence is etched in stone.

The circumstances surrounding his death are less clear, with many conflicting versions of how the musician’s life ended.

What is known is that an ambulance was called to a flat in the Samarkand Hotel in Notting Hill, London, at 11.18am on 18, September 1970.

When paramedics arrived at the scene, they found Hendrix lying on a bed, unresponsive. He was transported to St Mary Abbot’s Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 12.45pm.

A post-mortem examination and inquest found that Hendrix had choked on his own vomit and died of barbiturate-related asphyxia.

The flat was rented by Hendrix’s girlfriend, German painter Monika Dannemann, who had called the ambulance.

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In the hours before his death, she had driven him to a friend’s home at about 1.45am that morning, then picked him up and took him back to the flat at 3am.

She later said that Hendrix had taken nine of her prescribed sleeping tablets, 18 times the recommended dosage, as they were to be taken in halves.

In the days after Hendrix’s death, it emerged that a poem he had written had been found in the flat. Dannemann claimed he had written it about her, and Eric Burdon, a singer with bands The Animals and War, described it as a “suicide note”, though he later retracted this, saying he had misread the words.

The final words of what Hendrix had written, whether poem or a song he was working on, reportedly read: “The story of life is quicker than the wink of an eye/The story of love is hello and goodbye, until we meet again.”

The poem, often referred to as The Story Of Life, reportedly begins: “The story of Jesus/So easy to explain/After they crucified him/A woman, she claimed his name.”

It was also reported that Hendrix had left a message before he died on his manager Chas Chandler’s answering machine, with the words: “I need help bad, man.”