Today in Music History...March 31, 2017 (Now with links)

Music History: March 31

 

2015 British jazz pianist Ralph Sharon, who brought "I Left My Heart In San Francisco" to Tony Bennett, dies in Boulder, Colorado, at age 91.

2009 Lynyrd Skynyrd releases Live at the Cardiff Capitol Theatre. It features music recorded at Cardiff, Wales' Capitol Theatre on November 4, 1975. It's released alongside the album Authorized Bootleg: Live In Winterland, San Francisco, CA, 3/07/76.

2009 Lynyrd Skynyrd releases Authorized Bootleg: Live In Winterland, San Francisco, CA, 3/07/76. It's released alongside Live at the Cardiff Capitol Theatre.

2008 U2 join Madonna and sign a huge contract with Live Nation. Bono and Co. get a boatload of stock that they'd later sell off.

2007 Police issue arrest warrants for Country singer Billy Joe Shaver after he shoots and wounds a man outside a Lorena, Texas bar. Shaver later turns himself in.

2001 Mr. Acker Bilk receives an MBE (Member of the British Empire) medal from Queen Elizabeth for services to the music industry.

1996 Jeffrey Lee Pierce (Gun Club)

1995 23 year old Lance Cunningham injures four people at a Jimmy Page/Robert Plant concert in Auburn Hills, Michigan when he tries to rush the stage with a pocketknife. Cunningham claims he was trying to attack Page, accusing him of being "Satanic."

1995 Tejano singer Selena dies after being shot by her former personal assistant and former fan club president, Yolanda Saldivar, in Corpus Christi, Texas at the age of 23.

1993 Mitchell Parish

1992 Bruce Springsteen releases two albums, Human Touch and Lucky Town.

1987 Georg Listing (Tokio Hotel)

1986 O'Kelly Isley (of The Isley Brothers) dies of a heart attack at age 48 in Alpine, New Jersey.

1985 The Singing Nun

1984 Kenny Loggins' "Footloose" hits #1 in America. It's the title song to the now-famous film where Kevin Bacon brings dancing to a small town in the South.

1982 After twelve years together, The Doobie Brothers announce their (temporary) breakup.

1981 At the first ever Golden Raspberry Awards (aka The Razzies), Neil Diamond takes home the prize for Worst Actor for his performance as Yussel Rabinovitch in The Jazz Singer. Laurence Olivier, who played Cantor Rabinovitch in the film, also scores a Razzie for Best Supporting Actor, an honor he shares with John Adames for Gloria.

1973 Elton John appears on the front page of Melody Maker, which proclaims "Now Elton's A Teen Idol!"

1972 The official Beatles Fan Club disbands.

1972 America's LP America hits #1.

1971 Karl Lawrence King, who composed the Barnum and Bailey's circus music, dies at age 80.

1969 John Lennon and Yoko Ono hold a press conference in Vienna where they announce their "Bagism" project, giving the entire press conference from inside a white bag.

1969 Led Zeppelin's first album is released in the UK. The self-titled LP contains many hard rock classics, including "Dazed And Confused," "Good Times, Bad Times" and "Communication Breakdown."

1969 A short John Lennon film entitled Rape appears on Australian TV.

1969 George Harrison and his wife, Pattie, appear in court in Surrey, England, to answer recent charges of marijuana resin possession. Both are fined 250 pounds.

1967 The Beatles, Being For The Benefit of Mr. Kite!

1966 Elvis Presley's Frankie & Johnnie movie premieres in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

1962 The Shirelles, Soldier Boy

1962 In these pre-Beatles years, Connie Francis is one of the biggest stars in America. She scores her third #1 with "Don't Break The Heart That Loves You."

1960 Hank Ballard, "Finger Poppin' Time"

1959 Robert Holmes ('til tuesday)

1958 Pat McGlynn (The Bay City Rollers)

1958 Chuck Berry releases "Johnny B. Goode." The song is named after his piano player (Johnnie Johnson) and the street where he grew up (Goode Avenue).

1957 Sun Records stars Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins begin a tour of the South in Little Rock, Arkansas with Jerry Lee Lewis as a support act.

1956 Brenda Lee makes her US television debut, singing an unrehearsed version of Hank Williams' Jambalaya (On The Bayou) on ABC-TV's Ozark Jamboree.

1955 Angus Young is born in Glasgow, Scotland. He later moves to Australia and forms AC/DC with his brother Malcolm.

1954 Tony Brock (The Tubes, The Babys)

1953 Sean Hopper (Huey Lewis and the News)

1949 RCA introduces the 45 rpm record, which eventually becomes the format of choice for "singles," becoming more popular than the 78 rpm format by 1958.

1948 Jon Jon Poulos (The Buckinghams)

1948 Thijs Van Leer (Focus)

1947 Al Goodman (The Moments)

1946 Allan Nichol (The Turtles)

1944 Guitarist Mick Ralphs of Mott The Hoople and Bad Company is born in Herefordshire, England.

1944 Rod Allen (The Fortunes)

1935 Herb Alpert is born in Los Angeles, California.

1935 Herb Alpert

1935 Richard Chamberlain

1934 Shirley Jones (The Partridge Family)

1934 John D. Loudermilk is born in Durham, North Carolina. He records as "Johnny Dee," but has his most success as a songwriter, composing "Tobacco Road" and "Indian Reservation (The Lament of the Cherokee Reservation Indian)," a #1 hit for the Raiders in 1971.

1934 An article in Melody Maker declares: Expel All Jewish Musicians: A Little Hitler Invades Archer Street. Fascists Launch Fierce New Campaign.
This refers to an Imperial Fascist League member Jackson Phillips as the "Little Hitler" of Archer Street. The article contains the memorable quote: "...he saw the light of Fascism, and this apparently so dazzled him that he has been unable to see anything else very clearly since."

1933 Ina Anita Carter (The Carter Sisters)

1928 Lefty Frizzell

1921 Lowell Fulson

1908 Red Norvo

1685 Johann Sebastian Bach is born in Germany.

Jimi Hendrix Sets Guitar On Fire

 

1967At the Astoria Theatre in London, Jimi Hendrix sets fire to his guitar for the first time, and goes to the hospital after the show with minor burns. During the rest of the tour, Hendrix makes a habit of playing his guitar with his teeth, and he ignites his axe a few more times.
Despite Hendrix's reputation for destroying instruments during his performances, the audience can hardly be expecting such an inflammatory incident: The Jimi Hendrix Experience are at the bottom of the bill, opening up for three much tamer acts: The Walker Brothers, Cat Stevens and crooner Engelbert Humperdinck.

As the band perform their new song "Fire," Hendrix throws down his guitar onto the stage, creating an inferno of feedback. With the audience suitably distracted, band manager Chas Chandler covers the instrument with lighter fluid (which was dutifully purchased from the local store by a roadie earlier that day). Hendrix then strikes a series of matches until the Stratocaster is eventually engulfed in four-foot flames.

In the heat of the moment, Hendrix fails to realize that he has burned his hands, and after the blaze is extinguished, he completes the song using another guitar. After the show, he attends the local hospital for the treatment of minor burns.

The stunt was suggested by rock journalist Keith Altham, and it certainly fuels media coverage of the hot young star. The burning of a guitar becomes the centerpiece of many Experience shows from that point forward, most notably at Monterey later in the year where the stunt is caught on film.

In 2008, the charred remains of the Fender Stratocaster that was ignited in the Astoria show are auctioned, raising over half a million dollars.

Bowie Honored At Carnegie Hall

 

2016Michael Stipe, Cyndi Lauper, Ann Wilson and Perry Farrell are among the performers at a Carnegie Hall concert honoring David Bowie.
The concert is announced on January 10, but just hours later, news hits that Bowie had died. So many musicians volunteer to play the show that another date is added for the following day at Radio City Music Hall.

At Carnegie Hall, Debbie Harry does "Starman," Farrell plays "Rebel Rebel," and Jakob Dylan sings "Heroes." One of the more memorable performances is by The Flaming Lips, whose lead singer Wayne Coyne sings "Life On Mars?" on the shoulders of a bandmate dressed like Chewbacca.