Florence Foster Jenkins was an American socialite and amateur soprano who was known and mocked for her flamboyant performance costumes and notably poor singing ability. The historian Stephen Pile ranked her “the world’s worst opera singer … No one, before or since, has succeeded in liberating themselves quite so completely from the shackles of musical notation.”
Despite (or perhaps because of) her technical incompetence, she became a prominent musical cult figure in New York City during the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s. Cole Porter, Gian Carlo Menotti, Lily Pons, Sir Thomas Beecham, and other celebrities were fans. Enrico Caruso is said to have “regarded her with affection and respect”.
In the 1940s, New York socialite Florence Foster Jenkins (Meryl Streep) dreams of becoming a great opera singer. Unfortunately, her ambition far exceeds her talent. The voice Florence hears in her head is beautiful, but to everyone else it is quite lousy. Her husband St. Clair goes to extreme lengths to make sure his wife never finds out how awful she truly is. When Florence announces her plans for a concert at Carnegie Hall, St. Clair soon realizes that he’s facing his greatest challenge yet.
Today, we’ll be listening to the end of the William Tell Overture by Gioachino Rossini. This piece, originally the overture to an opera, has been arranged for piano and is in several method books, including Piano Pronto Movements 1 and 2. It’s also in Bastien Book 4 and Piano Maestro.
The original story
Maybe your grandparents watched the original Lone Ranger
Or you saw the newer Lone Ranger with Johnny Depp
Here’s the entire William Tell Overture played by an orchestra
Piano Solo
Franz Liszt made a really hard version for piano solo. See if you can follow along!
Piano Duet (1 piano, 4 hands)
Piano Duet arranged by Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Piano Duo (2 pianos, 8 hands)
Piano Quartet (4 pianos, 16 hands)
For pipe organ
For synthesizer
And then things get nuts with cartoons. Lots of cartoons used this music. Here are Mickey Mouse and friends
And Spike Jones
Handbells…
Poor Rossini – I think he’d have a fit if he knew how is music was being used.
• 1826 ~ Walter Cecil Macfarren, English pianist and composer, born in London
• 1850 ~ Wagner’s opera, Lohengrin, was performed for the first time.
• 1894 ~ Karl Böhm, Austrian conductor
1913 ~ Richard Tucker, American tenor
More information about Tucker
• 1924 ~ Dinah Washington, American rhythm-and-blues singer. She popularized many, many great songs, including What a Diff’rence a Day Makes, Unforgettable, and several hits with Brook Benton.
• 1925 ~ Billy (William Wayne) Grammer, Singer
• 1925 ~ Donald O’Connor, American dancer, singer and actor.
• 1931 ~ You Rascal You was recorded by Henry Allen, with the Luis Russell Band, for the Victor label.
• 1939 ~ Clem Cattini, Drummer with Tornados
• 1948 ~ Daniel Seraphine, Drummer with Chicago
• 1951 ~ Wayne Osmond, Singer with The Osmond Brothers
• 1964 ~ The Beatles appeared on the cover of LIFE magazine, only 6 months after they were first on the Ed Sullivan Show.
• 1984 ~ The Jacksons’ Victory Tour broke the record for concert ticket sales. The group surpassed the 1.1 million mark in only two months.
• 2002 ~ Kay Gardner, whose last musical work with the Bangor Symphony Orchestra memorialized the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, died of a heart attack. She was in her early 60s.
On hearing of her death, symphony officials scheduled Gardner’s work, “Lament for Thousand,” for the orchestra’s season-opening concert Oct. 13 at the Maine Center for the Arts in Orono.
Gardner was a pianist, flutist and conductor who performed in 46 states and several countries.
More than 20 years ago, she sued the Bangor Symphony, unsuccessfully, for sex discrimination after she had applied for a conducting position and learned that orchestra members had been asked how they felt about working with a female conductor.
In 2000, she was the guest conductor for a 40-member orchestra of women from the Bangor Symphony, playing a repertoire written by women.
Gardner studied music at the University of Michigan and at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. In 1972, she helped found a feminist and openly lesbian women’s band, Lavender Jane.
• 1834 ~ Hermann Mendel, German music lexicographer
• 1909 ~ Karl Ulrich Schnabel, German pianist and composer
• 1912 ~ Marina Koshetz, who followed her famous Russian diva mother Nina to the opera and concert stage and into the movies, was born. Koshetz was born in Moscow, trained in France and came to the United States as a teenager. She made her debut substituting for her mother Nina Koshetz on radio’s “Kraft Music Hall.” Using her father’s surname, she began appearing in films in the early 1930s as Marina Schubert. Among her early films were “Little Women,” “All the King’s Horses” and “British Agent.”
Marina concentrated more on her voice in the 1940s. Adopting the professional name Marina Koshetz, she went on to sing with the New York Metropolitan Opera and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Koshetz made her Los Angeles recital debut at the old Philharmonic Auditorium in 1947.
• 1921 ~ Buddy (William) Collette, Musician. reeds, piano and composer
• 1939 ~ After becoming a success with Ben Bernie on network radio, Dinah Shore started her own show on the NBC Blue radio network. Dinah sang every Sunday evening. Dinah also had a successful TV career spanning over two decades.
• 1940 ~ Columbia Records cut the prices of its 12-inch classical records. The records were priced to sell at $1. Within two weeks, RCA Victor did the same and ended a record-buying slump brought on by disinterested consumers.
• 1958 ~ Randy DeBarge, Musician, bass, vocals with DeBarge
• 1973 ~ Stevie Wonder came close to losing his life, following a freak auto accident. Wonder, one of Motown’s most popular recording artists, was in a coma for 10 days. Miraculously, he recovered and was back in the recording studio in less than eight weeks.
• 1981 ~ Stevie Nicks’ first solo album, Bella Donna, was released. The lead singer for Fleetwood Mac scored a top-three hit with Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around from the album. Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers were featured on the track. Nicks went on to record a total of 11 hits for the pop-rock charts through 1988.
• 1996 ~ “The Macarena” began its reign atop the U.S. pop charts
• 2012 ~ Marvin Hamlisch, American composer and conductor, died at the age of 68
• 2016 ~ Pete Fountain, the famed New Orleans jazz clarinetist whose 60-year career was marked by performances for presidents and a pope, making him an international ambassador for the music and culture of his hometown, died at the age of 86.
• 1925 ~ John Dexter, Opera director, Mid-America Chorale
• 1921 ~ Enrico Caruso, Italian operatic tenor, died in Naples.
• 1926 ~ The first demonstration of the Vitaphone system, that combined picture and sound for movies, was held at the Warner Theatre in New York City. John Barrymore and Mary Astor starred in the demonstration film for the new moving picture projector.
• 1935 ~ Hank Cochran, Pop Singer and songwriter
• 1937 ~ Garth Hudson, Musician, keyboard with The Band
• 1937 ~ Benny Goodman and his quartet recorded Smiles for Victor Records. Playing with Goodman’s clarinet on the famous song were Lionel Hampton, Teddy Wilson and Gene Krupa.
• 1939 ~ Edwin Patten, Singer with Gladys Knight & The Pips
• 1941 ~ Doris Kenner-Jackson (Coley), Singer with The Shirelles
• 1943 ~ Kathy Lennon, Singer with The Lennon Sisters
• 1951 ~ Andrew Gold, Singer, son of composer Ernest Gold
• 1991 ~ Jeri Southern passed away
• 1997 – Nigeria’s musician Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, who popularized the Afro-music beat globally, died of AIDS aged 58.
• 2000 ~ Helen Quinn, who for more than 30 years presided over the Metropolitan Opera patrons who lined up to buy standing-room tickets, died at the age of 76. Often called the Queen of Standees by those who allowed her to take charge of the ticket queue, Quinn was herself a veteran of standing-room lines at the Met, and attended five or six performances a week, almost always as a standee. In 1966, on her own initiative, she imposed a system on the standee process that the throng of regulars was apparently happy to abide by, and to which the Met gave tacit approval.
• 2001 ~ Ron Townson, the portly centerpiece singer for the Grammy-winning pop group The 5th Dimension, died of renal failure after a four-year battle with kidney disease. He was 68. Other members of the reconstituted group – known for such 1960s hits as Aquarius/Let the Sun Shine In, Wedding Bell Blues and Stoned Soul Picnic – performed at the Capitol Fourth music and fireworks show on July 4 in Washington, D.C. Declining health had forced Townson to retire from The 5th Dimension in 1997, bringing to an end a career that saw him tour with such music legends as Nat King’ Cole and Dorothy Dandridge, appear in operas and direct choirs. He helped front The 5th Dimension when the group’s smooth mixture of pop, jazz, gospel, and rhythm and blues won it four Grammys in 1968 for the Jimmy Webb song Up Up and Away. Other hits included One Less Bell to Answer and Sweet Blindness. As various members left The 5th Dimension in the 1970s to pursue solo projects, Townson formed the group Ron Townson and Wild Honey. Later, he reunited with McLemore and LaRue in a new version of The 5th Dimension that included Phyllis Battle and Greg Walker. He also appeared on television and in films, including the 1992 movie The Mambo Kings.
• 2002 ~ Freidann Parker, co-founder of the Colorado Ballet, died at the age of 77. Colorado Ballet co-founder Lillian Covillo met Parker in the late 1940s in a dance class taught by Martha Wilcox. The two began the Covillo-Parker School of Dance, and then a fledgling ballet company. After an ambitious double bill in 1961, they created Colorado Concert Ballet, which presented Denver’s first Nutcracker the following season. Every performance sold out. By 1978, the board of directors more than doubled its budget to $100,000, and Colorado Ballet was born. Today its budget has grown to $7 million with a roster of 40 dancers. Parker’s first dance lessons were with Iris Potter. She later trained with modern-dance pioneer Hanya Holm.
• 2020 ~ Leon Fleisher, American pianist and conductor, died at the age of 92. He was one of the most renowned pianists and pedagogues in the world. Music correspondent Elijah Ho has called him “one of the most refined and transcendent musicians the United States has ever produced”.
In 1964, Fleisher lost the use of his right hand, due to a condition that was eventually diagnosed as focal dystonia. Fleisher commenced performing and recording the left-handed repertoire while searching for a cure for his condition. In addition, he undertook conducting during this time, serving at one time as Music Director of the Annapolis Symphony Orchestra in Maryland. In the 1990s, Fleisher was able to ameliorate his focal dystonia symptoms after experimental botox injections to the point where he could play with both hands again.
• 1782 ~ Placidus Cajetan von Camerloher, Composer, died at the age of 63
• 1797 ~ Franz Schoberlechner, Composer
• 1865 ~ Robert Kahn, Composer
• 1870 ~ Josef Strauss, Austrian composer, died at the age of 42
• 1896 ~ Jean Rivier-Villemomble France, Composer
• 1898 ~ Ernest Willem Mulder, Composer
• 1898 ~ Sara Carter, Vocalist/guitarist with the Carter Family
• 1903 ~ Theodore Karyotakis, Composer
• 1906 ~ Daniel Ayala Perez, Composer
• 1915 ~ Floyd McDaniel ~ blues singer/guitarist
• 1920 ~ Isaac Stern, American concert violinist
Read quotes by and about Stern
More information about Stern
• 1920 ~ Manuel Valls Gorina, Composer
• 1921 ~ Billy Taylor, Orchestra leader on the David Frost Show
• 1922 ~ Kay Starr (Katherine Starks), Pop Singer
• 1925 ~ Lovro Zupanovic, Composer
• 1926 ~ Albert Fuller, American harpsichordist
• 1926 ~ Norman Jewison, Director of Jesus Christ, Superstar, Fiddler on the Roof
• 1927 ~ Stefan Niculescu, Composer
• 1931 ~ Leon Schidlowsky, Composer
• 1931 ~ Ted Husing was master of ceremonies for the very first CBS-TV program. The gala show featured singer Kate Smith, composer George Gershwin and New York City Mayor Jimmy Walker.
• 1935 ~ Kaye Stevens, Singer and comedienne on the Jerry Lewis Show
• 1938 ~ Anton Emil Kuerti, Composer
• 1938 ~ Paul Hindemith and Leonide Massines ballet premiered in London
• 1947 ~ Cat Stevens (Steven Demitri Georgiou) (Muslim name: Yusuf Islam), British folk-rock singer and songwriter
• 1948 ~ Donald Nichols Tweedy, Composer, died at the age of 58
• 1950 ~ Albert Riemenschneider, Composer, died at the age of 71
• 1958 ~ The last of Arthur Godfrey’s Talent Scouts programs aired on CBS-TV. Many artists got their start on Talent Scouts, including Tony Bennett, Pat Boone, The McGuire Sisters and a singer named Connie Francis, who not only sang but played the accordion, as well.
• 1969 ~ Just one day after Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon, Duke Ellington and a portion of his band performed a 10-minute composition on ABC-TV titled Moon Maiden. The work featured piano, drums, bass and vocals.
• 1973 ~ Bad, Bad Leroy Brown reached the top spot on the Billboard pop singles chart, becoming Jim Croce’s first big hit. Croce died in a plane crash two months later (September 20, 1973).
• 1976 ~ “Guys & Dolls” opened at Broadway Theater New York City for 239 performances
• 1994 ~ Dorothy Collins, Singer on Your Hit Parade, died at the age of 67
• 1995 ~ Edwin “Russell” House, Saxophonist, died at the age of 65
• 2000 ~ Iain Hamilton, the Scottish composer who turned Tolstoy’s “Anna Karenina” into an opera at the age of 78. Hamilton wrote four symphonies and dozens of orchestral and chamber works but is known best for his vocal music, which includes a cantata based on the poems of Robert Burns. “Anna Karenina” premiered at the English National Opera in 1981 to critical acclaim. His other operas include “Agamemnon”, “The Catiline Conspiracy”, based on a Ben Jonson play, and an adaptation of Peter Shaffer’s play “The Royal Hunt of the Sun”. From 1961 to 1978 he was a professor of music at Duke University in North Carolina.
• 2001 ~ Norman Hall Wright, the last surviving writer who worked on the Disney film Fantasia 2000, died at the age of 91. Wright studied at the University of Southern California before being hired by Walt Disney Productions. He started as an animator but later became a writer, producer and director. Wright developed the story of The Nutcracker Suite sequence for Fantasia 2000. He also was responsible for a sequence in Bambi. He wrote several cartoon shorts for Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy and also produced several Wonderful World of Disney television programs.
• 2002 ~ Gus Dudgeon, a respected music producer who worked on many of Elton John’s hit recordings, died in a car crash in western England. He was 59. Dudgeon produced Rocket Man,Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,Your Song,Daniel and Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me. Dudgeon also produced David Bowie’s Space Oddity and worked with other stars, including Chris Rea and Joan Armatrading. But it was his partnership with Sir Elton in the 1970s for which he will be best remembered. Dudgeon began his career in the early 1960s as a tea boy, running errands at Olympic Studios in London before joining Decca Records. He engineered the Zombies’ classic She’s Not There and the groundbreaking Blues Breakers album by John Mayall with Eric Clapton, before moving into producing.
• 2015 ~ Theodore Meir Bikel, Austrian-American actor, folk singer, musician, composer, and activist, died at the age of 91.
• 2023 ~ Tony Bennett died at the age of 96. In 1962, Bennett recorded his signature song, “I Left My Heart in San Francisco”.
• 1858 ~ Eugène Ysaÿe, Belgian violinist, conductor and composer. He taught fellow violinist Yehudi Menuhin for a short period.
• 1868 ~ Louis-Francois Dauprat, Composer, died at the age of 87
• 1901 ~ Fritz Mahler, Composer
• 1909 ~ John Edward “Teddy” Buckner, Trumpeter
• 1911 ~ Ginger Rogers, Dancer
Ginger and Fred Astaire
Ginger Rogers at 92 years old, dancing with her 29-year-old great-grandson. The first minute or so is a bit of a slow intro.. but stick it out, she is incredible. Most of us would love to be able to move like this at 22, let alone 92! (You do have to wonder whether she has bionic knees).
• 1912 ~ Ray Barr, American pianist on the Vincent Lopez Show
• 1916 ~ Ludwig P Scharwenka, German Composer, died at the age of 70
• 1925 ~ Cal Tjader, Vibraharpist
• 1928 ~ Bella Davidovich, Soviet-born American pianist
• 1934 ~ The NBC Red radio network premiered the musical drama, Dreams Come True. It was a show about baritone singer Barry McKinley and his novelist sweetheart.
• 1936 ~ Buddy Merrill, American guitarist on the Lawrence Welk Show
• 1939 ~ William Bell, American singer
• 1940 ~ Tony Jackson, British rock bassist, vocalist with the Searchers
• 1947 ~ Tom Boggs ~ rock drummer (Box Tops)
• 1948 ~ Pinchas Zuckerman, Israeli violinist, violist and conductor
• 1948 ~ Ruben Blades, Singer
• 1949 ~ Alan “Fitz” Fitzgerald, Rock keyboardist, vocalist
• 1949 ~ Ray Major, Rock guitarist
• 1952 ~ Stewart Copeland, Drummer
• 1956 ~ Ian Curtis ~ English rock vocalist (Joy Division-Transmission)
• 1972 ~ Giorgio Nataletti, Composer, died at the age of 65
• 1972 ~ Max Zehnder, Composer, died at the age of 70
• 1981 ~ Harry Chapin, Folk vocalist, died in a car crash in New York. Chapin was 38. His hit songs included Taxi, W-O-L-D and the million-seller, Cat’s in the Cradle. He was a champion of the hungry and homeless and organized a massive effort to provide food for the needy. This was his legacy to the world; his work continues by other performers.
• 1984 ~ Billy Williams, Singer in Your Show of Shows, died at the age of 73
• 1985 ~ Wayne King, Orchestra leader, Wayne King Show, died at the age of 84
• 1986 ~ Columbia Records announced that after 28 years with the label, the contract of country star Johnny Cash would not be renewed. Cash recorded 13 hits on the pop music charts from 1956 to 1976, all but four on Columbia. The others were on Sam Phillips’ Memphis-based label, Sun. Cash’s biggest hit for Columbia was A Boy Named Sue in 1969.
• 1989 ~ Herbert von Karajan, Austrian conductor, died at the age of 81. He was one of the great conductors of the 20th century, dominating the post-war world of music in the concert hall, opera house and recording studio.
• 1994 ~ 3 Tenors, Placido Domingo, Luciano Pavarotti and José Carreras, perform in LA
• 1995 ~ Charles Bruck, Hungarian-French-American conductor, died at the age of 83
• 1996 ~ John Panozzo, Drummer, died at the age of 48
• 1668 ~ Van Marco Cesti’s opera “Il Pomo d’Oro,” premiered in Vienna
• 1813 ~ Johann Friedrich Peter, Composer, died at the age of 67
• 1844 ~ Johann Gansbacher, Composer, died at the age of 66
• 1866 ~ C.C. Birchard, Music Publisher
• 1877 ~ Karl Erb, German tenor
• 1884 ~ John Francis Larchet, Composer
• 1889 ~ Carli Zoeller, Composer, died at the age of 49
• 1891 ~ Franco Casavola, Composer
• 1894 ~ Juventino Rosas, Composer, died at the age of 26
• 1898 ~ Guglielmo Marconi patented the radio
• 1903 ~ August Reissmann, Composer, died at the age of 77
• 1906 ~ Harry Sosnik, American orchestra leader of the Jack Carter Show and Your Hit Parade
• 1909 ~ David Branson, Composer
• 1909 ~ Paul Constantinescu, Composer
• 1909 ~ Washington Castro, Composer
• 1913 ~ Ladislav Holoubek, Composer
• 1915 ~ Paul Williams, Jazz saxophonist and bandleader Williams played with Clarence Dorsey in 1946, and then made his recording debut with King Porter in 1947 for Paradise before forming his own band later that year.
• 1921 ~ Ernest Gold, Composer
• 1921 ~ Charles Scribner Jr, Music publisher
• 1923 ~ Asger Hamerik (Hammerich) German composer, died at the age of 80
• 1924 ~ Carlo Bergonzi, Italian tenor
• 1926 ~ Meyer Kupferman, American composer
• 1928 ~ Donal Michalsky, Composer
• 1932 ~ Per Nørgård, Danish composer
More information about Nørgård
• 1934 ~ Roger Reynolds, Composer
• 1936 ~ Izydor Lotto, Composer, died at the age of 91
• 1939 ~ Frank Sinatra made his recording debut with the Harry James band. Frankie sang Melancholy Mood and From the Bottom of My Heart.
• 1942 ~ Roger McGuinn, Musician, guitarist and vocalist with the Byrds (1965 US & UK No.1 single ‘Mr Tambourine Man’). He was the only member of The Byrds to play on the hit, the others being session players. He toured with Bob Dylan in 1975 and 1976 as part of Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue, and later worked with fellow ex-Byrds Gene Clark and Chris Hillman to form “McGuinn, Clark and Hillman”.
• 1951 ~ Arnold Schoenberg, Austrian-born composer, died in Los Angeles; he was best known for his 12-note serial method and his composition Verklaerte Nacht and his opera “Moses und Aaron.”
More information about Schoenberg
• 1942 ~ Stephen Jo Bladd, American drummer with the J Geils Band
• 1954 ~ Louise Mandrell, American country singer with the Mandrell Sisters
• 1958 ~ Karl Erb, German tenor, died on 81st birthday
• 1959 ~ Dedicated to the One I Love, by The Shirelles, was released. The tune went to number 83 on the Top 100 chart of “Billboard” magazine. The song was re-released in 1961 and made it to number three on the charts.
• 1961 ~ Lawrence Donegan, Musician, bass with Lloyd Cole & The Commotions
• 1965 ~ Neil Thrasher, Country Singer
• 1973 ~ Martian Negrea, Composer, died at the age of 80
• 1973 ~ The Everly Brothers called it quits during a concert at the John Wayne Theatre in Buena Park, CA. Phil Everly walked off the stage in the middle of the show and brother Don said, “The Everly Brothers died ten years ago.” The duo reunited a decade later for a short time.
• 1976 ~ Max Butting, Composer, died at the age of 87
• 1978 ~ Antonio Veretti, Composer, died at the age of 78
• 1985 ~ Duran Duran took A View to a Kill, from the James Bond movie of the same name, to the top of the record charts this day. The song stayed on top for two weeks. Live and Let Die by Wings and Nobody Does It Better by Carly Simon — both James Bond themes — got only as high as number two on the record charts.
• 1985 ~ Live Aid, a rock concert masterminded by Bob Geldof, took place in London, Sydney, Moscow and Philadelphia and raised over 60 million dollars for famine in Africa.
• 1992 ~ Carla van Neste, Belgian violinist, died at the age of 78
• 1994 ~ Eddie Boyd, Blues vocalist and pianist, died at the age of 79
• 2023 ~ André Watts, pianist and Jacobs School professor, died at the age of 77. Watts made his national concert debut when he was 16 years old with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic. Shortly after, he was asked to substitute in place of Glenn Gould with the Philharmonic. That performance is credited with launching Watts’ career.
• 1915 ~ Laverne Andrews, Pop Singer
More information about The Andrews Sisters
• 1915 ~ Dorothy Kirsten, Opera Singer
• 1925 ~ Merv Griffin, Entertainer
• 1925 ~ Bill Haley, American rock-and-roll singer, songwriter and guitarist with Bill Haley and His Comets
• 1932 ~ Della Reese (Delloreese Patricia Early), Pop Singer
• 1937 ~ Vladimir Ashkenazy, Russian-born Icelandic pianist and conductor
More information about Ashkenazy Grammy winner
• 1937 ~ Gene Chandler (Eugene Dixon), Singer
• 1937 ~ The big band classic, Sing, Sing, Sing was recorded by Benny Goodman and his band. Sitting in on this famous Victor Records session was Gene Krupa, Ziggy Elman and Harry James.
• 1945 ~ Rik Elswit, Musician, guitarist and singer with Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show
• 1954 ~ Nanci Griffith, Grammy Award-winning singer, songwriter
• 1957 ~ John Lennon and Paul McCartney met for the first time at The Woolton Church Parish Fete where The Quarry Men were appearing. As The Quarry Men were setting up for their evening performance, McCartney eager to impress Lennon picked up a guitar and played ‘Twenty Flight Rock’ (Eddie Cochran) and ‘Be-Bop-A-Lula’ (Gene Vincent). Lennon was impressed, and even more so when McCartney showed Lennon and Eric Griffiths how to tune their guitars, something they’d been paying someone else to do for them.
• 1959 ~ Jon Keeble, Musician, drummer with Spandau Balle
• 1971 ~ Louis Armstrong, Jazz musician, died. His groups, the Hot Five and Hot Seven, from 1925 to 1927, had a revolutionary impact on jazz.
• 1971 ~ Karen and Richard Carpenter hosted the summer series, Make Your Own Kind of Music, on NBC-TV.
• 1973 ~ Otto Klemperer, German conductor particularly known for his interpretations of Beethoven, died.
• 1984 ~ Michael Jackson and his brothers started their Victory Tour in Kansas City, Missouri’s Arrowhead Stadium. The tour turned out to be a victory for the Jacksons when the nationwide concert tour concluded months later.
• 1998 ~ Roy Rogers, U.S. film actor known as “the singing cowboy”, died.
• 2000 ~ Władysław Szpilman, Polish pianist and classical composer, died at the age of 88
• 2020 ~ Country Music legend Charlie Daniels, best known for his monster 1979 hit “The Devil Went Down to Georgia,” died at the age of 83.
• 2020 ~ Ennio Morricone wrote the scores for more than 500 movies and TV series, as well as over 100 works for the concert hall. He died following complications from a fall at the age of 91.
• 1847 ~ Agnes Marie Jacobina Zimmermann, Composer
• 1852 ~ Stefano Gobatti, Composer
• 1874 ~ Gerhard von Keussler, Composer
• 1877 ~ Wanda Landowska, Harpsichordist
• 1878 ~ Joseph Holbrooke, English pianist, conductor and composer
• 1897 ~ Paul Ben-Haim, Israeli composer and student of Middle Eastern folk music
• 1918 ~ George Rochberg, American composer and music editor
• 1924 ~ Janos Starker, Hungarian-born Grammy Award-winning American cellist.
• 1934 ~ Love in Bloom, sung by Bing Crosby with Irving Aaronson’s orchestra, was recorded for Brunswick Records in Los Angeles. The song was fairly popular, but became a much bigger success when comedian Jack Benny made it a popular standard.
• 1944 ~ Robbie Robertson, Musician, composer, guitarist with The Band
• 1950 ~ Michael Monarch, Musician, guitarist with Steppenwolf
• 1951 ~ Huey Lewis (Cregg), Rock Singer
• 1954 ~ Elvis Presley recorded That’s All Right (Mama) and Blue Moon of Kentucky. It was his first session for Sam Phillips and Sun Records in Memphis, TN.
• 1965 ~ Maria Callas gave her last stage performance, singing Puccini’s opera “Tosca” at London’s Covent Garden.
• 1969 ~ The Rolling Stones gave a free concert in Hyde Park, London, in memory of Brian Jones, who had died two days before.
• 1983 ~ Placido Domingo’s performance of Puccini’s opera La Bohème had one and one-half hours of applause and 83 curtain calls at the State Opera house in Vienna, Austria.
• 2001 ~ Ernie K-Doe, a flamboyant rhythm and blues singer who had a No. 1 hit with Mother-In-Law in 1961, died Thursday. He was 65. K-Doe, born Ernest Kador Jr., was one of many New Orleans musicians, including Fats Domino, Aaron Neville and The Dixie Cups, who landed singles at or near the top of the national charts in the 1950s and ’60s. He had a handful of minor hits, such as T’aint it the Truth,Come on Home and Te-Ta-Te-Ta-Ta. But he was forever associated with his only No. 1 single. Mother-In-Law was produced by legendary New Orleans producer and songwriter Allen Toussaint, who also played piano for the recording. In 1995, K-Doe opened Ernie K-Doe’s Mother-In-Law Lounge near the French Quarter, where he performed on Sundays.
• 2003 ~ Johnny Cash made his last ever live performance when he appeared at the Carter Ranch. Before singing “Ring of Fire”, Cash read a statement about his late wife that he had written shortly before taking the stage: “The spirit of June Carter overshadows me tonight with the love she had for me and the love I have for her. We connect somewhere between here and heaven. She came down for a short visit, I guess, from heaven to visit with me tonight to give me courage and inspiration like she always has.” Cash died on Sept 12th of that same year.
1913 ~ Richard Tucker, American tenor
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