Sunday, March 30, 2008

This Day In Music History- March 30

Slowhand, Eric Clapton ("I Shot The Sheriff") turns 63.

Rolf Harris ("Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport") is 78.

Lesley Gore first appeared on TV, on ABC's "American Bandstand" in 1963.

Jim "Dandy" Mangrum of Black Oak Arkansas ("Jim Dandy") turns 60.

John Denver's "Sunshine on My Shoulders" went to No. 1 on the pop chart in 1974.

Also in 1974, the Ramones played their first-ever gig at New York's Performance Studio (Thank God, They Are Punk Boys!).

Miles Davis released Bitches Brew in 1970. Over time it became the cornerstone of a jazz-rock movement known as "fusion."

In 1968, Celine Dion was born in Charlemagne, Quebec.

The cover for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was photographed at a studio on London's Flood Street in 1967, using cardboard cutouts and wax figures to represent the Beatles' heroes. The effigies featured include Edgar Allan Poe, Lenny Bruce, Vidal Sassoon, Laurel and Hardy, Bob Dylan, and Huntz Hall.

Hammer time officially began in 1962, when Stanley Kirk Burrell, aka MC Hammer-aka Hammer, was born in Oakland, Calif.

Frankie Laine, one of the best pop singers of the 1950s, was born in Chicago in 1913. His hits included the No. 3 "Moonlight Gambler."

Sonny Boy Williamson, a master of the blues harmonica whose songs were covered by the Grateful Dead, the Allman Brothers Band, Canned Heat, and Rod Stewart, was born in Jackson, Tennessee in 1914.

In 1946, Mahalia Jackson signed with Apollo Records, where she recorded some of her most fervid and best-loved gospel slides over the next eight years.

"He's So Fine" by the Chiffons hits #1 in 1963.

16 year old Lesley Gore recorded her breakthrough hit, "It's My Party" in 1963. Producer Quincy Jones hurried Gore into the studio when he found out that Phil Spector was going to cut the song with The Crystals.

Buddy Knox became the first artist in the Rock 'n' Roll era to write his own number one hit when "Party Doll" topped the Billboard chart in 1957. Buddy would go on to place four more songs in the Top 40 between 1957 and 1961.

In 1976, the Sex Pistols played their first London show and attracted an audience of 50 or so.

The Eagles’ Hotel California” hits the top of the album chart in 1977.

Little Richard had his final US Top 10 hit with "Good Golly Miss Molly" in 1958. The song was from his last recording sessions for Specialty Records, after which he recorded a series of gospel songs.

In 1962, the Russian newspaper Pravda warned communist youths about the dangers of dancing the Twist.

In 1989, Gladys Knight performed without The Pips for the first time since grammar school at a show at Bally's in Las Vegas.

In 1992, The soundtrack to Wayne's World was the number 1 album in the US. It featured the return to the charts of Queen's, "Bohemian Rhapsody", actually making the song a bigger hit the second time around. Tracks by Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, Alice Cooper, as well as a new version of "Dream Weaver" from Gary Wright, were also included on the LP.