John Field lived from 1782 until 1837 and was an Irish pianist and composer. He has been credited the invention of the Nocturne, a form later adopted and developed by Chopin. Field was born in Dublin in 1782, the son of a violinist, but moved with his family to London in 1793, perhaps taking violin lessons from Haydn’s friend Salomon.
He became an apprentice of Muzio Clementi, appearing in a series of important London concerts, and later touring widely. After concerts in Russia, he remained in St. Petersburg, where he became a fashionable teacher and performer, moving to Moscow in 1821. Illness brought him, in 1831, to London again, a visit followed by a continental tour and a final return to Moscow, where he died in 1837.
Flowtow
Friedrich Adolf Ferdinand, Freiherr von Flotow was a German composer. He is chiefly remembered for his opera Martha, which was popular in the 19th century and the early part of the 20th.
. 1712 ~ John Stanley, English composer and organist
. 1728 ~ Johann Gottfried Muthel, German composer and noted keyboard virtuoso
. 1734 ~ François-Joseph Gossec, Belgian composer
More information about Gossec
. 1750 ~ Tomaso Albinoni, Italian composer (Adagio in G Minor), died at the age of 78
. 1876 ~ The saxophone was played by Etta Morgan at New York City’s Olympic Theatre. The instrument was little known at the time in the United States.
. 1913 ~ Vido Musso, Reed instruments, played with Benny Goodman, bandleader: Stan Kenton was his pianist
. 1917 ~ Ulysses Simpson Kay, US composer, born in Tucson, Arizona (d. 1995)
. 1920 ~ George Handy (George Joseph Hendleman), Pianist, composer, arranger for the Boyd Raeburn band, Alvino Rey band, Paramount Studios
. 1922 ~ Betty White, Emmy Award-winning actress on The Mary Tyler Moore Show, singer
. 1926 ~ Moira Shearer, Ballerina
. 1927 ~ Eartha Kitt, Singer. Kitt’s birth certificate listing her actual birthdate as 1/17/27 was found in 1997. She has celebrated her birthday as Jan. 26 (1928) all of her life and says, “It’s been the 26th of January since the beginning of time and I’m not going to change it and confuse my fans.”
. 1938 ~The first jazz concert is performed at Carnegie Hall.Benny Goodman and his orchestra performed at this iconic New York City venue and the event included guests like Count Basie and other popular names of the day. It gave the genre credibility as a legitimate musical preference.
. 1941 ~ Gene Krupa and his band recorded the standard, Drum Boogie, on Okeh Records. The lady singing with the boys in the band during the song’s chorus was Irene Daye.
. 1944 ~ Chris Montez, Singer
. 1948 ~ Mick Taylor, Singer, rhythm guitar with The Rolling Stones
. 1955 ~ Steve Earle, Songwriter, singer, guitar
. 1956 ~ Paul Young, Singer
. 1959 ~ Susanna Hoffs, Singer, guitar with The Bangles
. 1960 ~ John Crawford, Singer, bass with Berlin
. 1969 ~ Lady Samantha, one of the very first recordings by Reginald Kenneth Dwight (aka Elton John), was released in England on Philips records. The song floundered, then bombed. The rock group, Three Dog Night, however, recorded it for an album.
. 2001 ~ Pianist and singer Emma Kelly, the “Lady of 6,000 Songs” made famous by the book “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil,” died from a liver ailment at the age of 82. Kelly’s nightclub act, in which she tapped her vast repertoire of American popular standards five nights a week until she became ill a month ago, was a must-see for Savannah tourists itching to meet a real-life character from author John Berendt’s Southern Gothic best seller. Though the book helped her book performances from New York to Switzerland, Kelly continued to crisscross south Georgia to play church socials and high school graduations, Kiwanis luncheons and wedding receptions. Berendt devoted an entire chapter to Kelly in the 1994 book, describing her as a teetotaling Baptist who would play smoky cocktail lounges Saturday nights and Sunday school classes the next morning. Kelly performed at her own nightclub, Emma’s, in Savannah, for five years in the late 1980s. She then bounced between lounges near the downtown riverfront. She also independently recorded three albums, the last of which were released posthumously, her son said.
. 2001 ~ Jazz musician, composer and conductor Norris Turney, who played alto sax and flute with the Duke Ellington Orchestra and led the Norris Turney Quartet, died of kidney failure at the age of 79. Turney recorded with a number of bands over the years, and toured with Billy Eckstine, Ray Charles and others. He was an original member of the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra directed by Wynton Marsalis. Turney’s lone CD as a bandleader, “Big, Sweet ‘N Blue,” was warmly received by jazz critics.
. 2002 ~ Edouard Nies-Berger, the veteran organist and protege of Albert Schweitzer, died at the age of 98. Nies-Berger, who played with the New York Philharmonic, was a native of Strasbourg in Alsace. His father, a church organist, was an associate of Schweitzer. The doctor, philosopher and Nobel laureate was pastor of a nearby church where the teenage Nies-Berger played occasionally. Nies-Berger moved to New York in 1922 and for the next 15 years played the organ in houses of worship across the country. By the mid-’30s he settled in Los Angeles and performed in the soundtracks of several films, including “The Bride of Frankenstein” and “San Francisco.” He returned to Europe in 1937 to study conducting with Bruno Walter in Salzburg, Austria. After conducting for two years in Latvia and Belgium he returned to the United States. He was named organist of the New York Philharmonic, where he played under the direction of such conductors as Walter, George Szell and Leonard Bernstein. Nies-Berger was reunited with Schweitzer in 1949, when the humanitarian visited the United States. For six years they collaborated on the completion of Schweitzer’s edition of the organ music of Johann Sebastian Bach. After serving at St. Paul’s in Richmond, Nies-Berger returned to Europe for several years to perform as a recitalist and write several books, including a memoir of Schweitzer. In 1991 he was awarded the gold medal of the Art Institute of Alsace, and in 1993 was named a knight of the arts and letters by the French Ministry of Education and Culture.
. 2013 ~ Lizbeth Webb, English soprano, died at the age of 86
Sammy Cahn (Samuel Cohen) lived from 1913 until 1993. If you care about anything at all, there’s a song written by Sammy Cahn for you to relate to. Sammy Cahn, the Tin Pan Alley legend, was born Samuel Cohen in New York City.
As a youngster, little Sammy wanted to grow up to be a famous vaudeville fiddler. How lucky we are that he stopped thinking about this in his teenage years. That’s when he met pianist, Saul Chaplin. Sammy wrote the words and Saul wrote the music to their first hit, Rhythm is Our Business for bandleader, Jimmie Lunceford. Then Until the Real Thing Comes Along for Andy Kirk and the jazz classic, Shoe Shine Boy, performed by Count Basie, Louis Armstrong, the Mills Brothers, even Bing Crosby. The Andrews Sisters were lucky to know Sammy, too. It was his adaptation of the Yiddish song, Bei Mir Bist Du Schön that became their signature.
Frank Sinatra’s many signature titles were Sammy Cahn’s words, too (with Jimmy Van Heusen’s music): All the Way (won an Oscar in 1957), My Kind of Town, and Grammy Award-winning September of My Years. As part of the personal song-writing team for Mr. Sinatra, Sammy also wrote Love and Marriage, The Second Time Around, High Hopes (another Oscar winner in 1959) and The Tender Trap.
If you still haven’t found a song that makes you care, try these additional Oscar winners by Sammy Cahn: Three Coins in the Fountain (1954) and Call Me Irresponsible (1963). He composed 22 other songs that were nominated but didn’t win the gold statue!
Want to know more? Pick up the autobiography of the talented Sammy Cahn, written in 1974, I Should Care.
Cage
John (Milton) Cage lived from 1912 until 1992. He was an American composer who was born in Los Angeles, California, USA. He studied with a number of teachers including Henry Cowell and Arnold Schoenberg, who helped provoke his avant-garde proclivities. He began writing all-percussion pieces in the 1930s and proclaimed the use of noise as the next musical horizon; in 1938 he introduced the “prepared piano,” an instrument whose sound is radically modified by various objects placed on the strings. While writing much for prepared piano in the 1940s, notably the Sonatas and Interludes, he also produced some pioneering electronic music. Among the most widely influential elements of his thought was the idea of indeterminacy, music that is not strictly controlled, as seen in his 1951 Landscape No. 4 for twelve radios – the sound of which depends on what happens to be on the air. Later works, especially the notorious 4’33” (1954), involve complete silence. He continued to develop such concepts and he also produced several quirky, engaging books beginning with the 1961 Silence. In his later years he was widely acclaimed as one of the more original of American artists.
Caruso
Enrico Caruso was a tenor opera singer who lived from 1873 until 1921. His best known roles are Canio in Pagliacci, Rodolfo in La Bohème. He made his Metropolitan Opera debut in Rigoletto. He sang nearly 70 roles and appeared in nearly every country of Europe and North and South America. His final performance was La Juive at the Met in 1920.
Carissimi
Giacomo Carissimi lived from 1604 until 1674. He is considered to be one of the greatest Italian composers of the 17th century, notable for his oratorios and secular cantatas.
Cash
John R. Cash was born Feb. 26, 1932, in Kingsland, Ark., one of seven children. When he was 12, his 14-year-old brother and hero, Jack, died after an accident while sawing oak trees into fence posts. The tragedy had a lasting impact on Cash, and he later pointed to it as a possible reason his music was frequently melancholy.
He worked as a custodian and enlisted in the Air Force, learning guitar while stationed in Germany, before launching his music career after his 1954 discharge.
“All through the Air Force, I was so lonely for those three years,” Cash told The Associated Press during a 1996 interview. “If I couldn’t have sung all those old country songs, I don’t think I could have made it.”
Cash launched his career in Memphis, performing on radio station KWEM. He auditioned with Sun Records, ultimately recording the single Hey Porter, which became a hit.
Sun Records also launched the careers of Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis and others.
Folsom Prison Blues, went to No. 4 on the country charts in 1956, and featured Cash’s most famous couplet: “I shot a man in Reno/ just to watch him die.”
Cash recorded theme albums celebrating the railroads and the Old West, and decrying the mistreatment of American Indians. Two of his most popular albums were recorded live at prisons. Along the way he notched 14 No. 1 country music hits.
Because of Cash’s frequent performances in prisons and his rowdy lifestyle early in his career, many people wrongly thought he had served prison time. He never did, though he battled addictions to pills on and off throughout his life.
He blamed fame for his vulnerability to drug addiction.
“When I was a kid, I always knew I’d sing on the radio someday. I never thought about fame until it started happening to me,” he said in 1988. “Then it was hard to handle. That’s why I turned to pills.”
He credited June Carter Cash, whom he married in 1968, with helping him stay off drugs, though he had several relapses over the years and was treated at the Betty Ford Center in California in 1984.
June Carter Cash was the daughter of country music great Mother Maybelle Carter, and the mother of singer Carlene Carter, whose father was country singer Carl Smith. Together, June Carter and Cash had one child, John Carter Cash. He is a musician and producer.
Singer Roseanne Cash is Johnny Cash’s daughter from his first marriage, to Vivian Liberto. Their other three children were Kathleen, Cindy and Tara. They divorced in 1966.
In March 1998, Cash made headlines when his California-based record company, American Recordings, took out an advertisement in the music trade magazine Billboard. The full-page ad celebrated Cash’s 1998 Grammy award for best country album for “Unchained.” The ad showed an enraged-looking Cash in his younger years making an obscene gesture to sarcastically illustrate his thanks to country radio stations and “the country music establishment in Nashville,” which he felt had unfairly cast him aside.
Jennings, a close friend, once said of Cash: “He’s been like a brother to me. He’s one of the greatest people in the world.”
Cash once credited his mother, Carrie Rivers Cash, with encouraging him to pursue a singing career.
“My mother told me to keep on singing, and that kept me working through the cotton fields. She said God has his hand on you. You’ll be singing for the world someday.”
Dozens of hit records like Folsom Prison Blues, I Walk the Line, and Sunday Morning Coming Down defined Cash’s persona: a haunted, dignified, resilient spokesman for the working man and downtrodden.
Cash’s deeply lined face fit well with his unsteady voice, which was limited in range but used to great effect to sing about prisoners, heartaches, and tales of everyday life. He wrote much of his own material, and was among the first to record the songs of Bob Dylan and Kris Kristofferson.
One Piece at a Time was about an assembly line worker who built a car out of parts stolen from his factory. A Boy Named Sue was a comical story of a father who gives his son a girl’s name to make him tough. The Ballad of Ira Hayes told of the drunken death of an American Indian soldier who helped raise the American flag at Iwo Jima during World War II, but returned to harsh racism in America.
Cash said in his 1997 autobiography “Cash” that he tried to speak for “voices that were ignored or even suppressed in the entertainment media, not to mention the political and educational establishments.”
Cash’s career spanned generations, with each finding something of value in his simple records, many of which used his trademark rockabilly rhythm.
Cash was a peer of Elvis Presley when rock ‘n’ roll was born in Memphis in the 1950s, and he scored hits like Cry! Cry! Cry! during that era. He had a longtime friendship and recorded with Dylan, who has cited Cash as a major influence.
He won 11 Grammys – most recently in 2003, when Give My Love To Rose earned him honors as best male country vocal performance – and numerous Country Music Association awards. He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1980 and inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.
His second wife, June Carter Cash, and daughter Roseanne Cash also were successful singers. June Carter Cash, who co-wrote Cash’s hit Ring of Fire and partnered with her husband in hits such as Jackson, died in May 2003.
The late 1960s and ’70s were Cash’s peak commercial years, and he was host of his own ABC variety show from 1969-71. In later years, he was part of the Highwayman supergroup with Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson.
In the 1990s, he found a new artistic life recording with rap and hard rock producer Rick Rubin on the label American Recordings. And he was back on the charts with the 2002 album “American IV: The Man Comes Around.”
Most recently, Cash was recognized for his cover of the Nine Inch Nails song Hurt with seven nominations at the August 2003 MTV Video Music Awards. He had hoped to attend the event but couldn’t because of his hospital stay. The video won for best cinematography.
He also wrote books including two autobiographies, and acted in films and television shows.
In his 1971 hit Man in Black, Cash said his black clothing symbolized the downtrodden people in the world. Cash had been “The Man in Black” since he joined the Grand Ole Opry at age 25.
“Everybody was wearing rhinestones, all those sparkle clothes and cowboy boots,” he said in 1986. “I decided to wear a black shirt and pants and see if I could get by with it. I did and I’ve worn black clothes ever since.”
Johnny Cash, ‘”The Man in Black” who became a towering figure in American music with such hits as Folsom Prison Blues, I Walk the Line, and A Boy Named Sue, died Friday, September 12, 2003. He was 71.
“Johnny died due to complications from diabetes, which resulted in respiratory failure,” Cash’s manager, Lou Robin, said in a statement issued by Baptist Hospital in Nashville.”
Cash had battled a disease of the nervous system, autonomic neuropathy, and pneumonia in recent years. Cash lived in Hendersonville, Tenn., just outside of Nashville. He also had a home in Jamaica.
Cesti
Marc Antonio Cesti, 1623 to 1669, was an Italian composer working in Venice, Rome and Vienna. He reputedly wrote over one hundred operas of which 15 are extant.
Charles
Ray Charles (Robinson) is a singer, pianist, composer who was born in Albany, Ga in 1930. He lost his sight (from glaucoma) when he was six and attended a school for the blind where he learned to read and write music in braille and play piano and organ. Orphaned at age 15, he left school and began playing music to earn a living, moving to Seattle, Wash., in 1947. Dropping his last name, he performed at clubs in the smooth lounge-swing style of Nat “King” Cole. After some hits on Swing Time Records, he switched to Atlantic Records in 1952 and began to develop a rougher blues and gospel style. For New Orleans bluesman, Guitar Slim, he arranged and played piano on “The Things I Used To Do” (1953); the record sold a million copies. He went on to record his own “I’ve Got a Woman” in 1955 with an arrangement of horns, gospel-style piano, and impassioned vocals that led to the gospel-pop and soul music of the 1960s and to his hit “What’d I Say” (1959). Possessing a multifaceted talent, he recorded with jazz vibist Milt Jackson, made a country and western album that sold 3 million copies (1962), and continued to release a variety of pop hits, Broadway standards, and blues, gospel, and jazz albums. A major influence on popular black music during his early years, he gradually reached out to influence both white musicians and audiences. And although he had been convicted of using drugs in the 1950s, he lived to see the day when he was so acceptable to mainstream Americans that he became virtually the chief image for promoting Pepsi-Cola and he was asked to perform at many national patriotic and political events.
Charpentier
Marc Antoine Charpentier, 1636 to 1704, was a French composer who studied in Italy. When he returned to France he became the most outstanding French composer of oratorios.
Cherubini
Luigi Cherubini lived from 1760 until 1842. The Italian composer Cherubini came to occupy a dominant position in French musical life. He was employed at the Conservatoire in Paris on its foundation and from 1822 was director of the institution, retaining this position until the year of his death. His works include compositions for the stage, the church and for political purposes, a requirement of the turbulent revolutionary years.
Cherubini wrote some 30 operas and of these Les deux journées, now seldom heard, had influence on Beethoven’s only opera, Fidelio. The opera Médée, first staged in Paris in 1797, remains in occasional repertoire, with the aria Ah, nos peines, providing a popular soprano operatic recital item.
Chopin
Step into the melodious world of Frédéric François Chopin (1 March 1810 – 17 October 1849), the Polish maestro who danced his fingers across the piano keys, creating ripples in the Romantic era. Renowned globally as a virtuoso pianist and composer, Chopin dedicated his life to the ivory keys, weaving compositions that spoke a poetic language, unmatched in technique and emotional depth.
Born in the quaint village of Żelazowa Wola, in what was then the Duchy of Warsaw, Chopin grew up under the artistic skyline of Warsaw. As Congress Poland unfolded its wings, so did Chopin’s prodigious talent. By the tender age of 20, having already mastered his art in Warsaw, he embarked on a journey just before the November 1830 Uprising broke out, a journey that would take him to the heart of Paris at 21.
Parisian life saw Chopin shine not in grand concert halls, but in the intimate embrace of salons, where his music found a home. In these salons, he enchanted a select few with 30 public performances, sustaining his life through the sale of his compositions and highly sought-after piano lessons. Among his admirers and friends was the legendary Franz Liszt, alongside other contemporaries like Robert Schumann, who were spellbound by his musical prowess.
Chopin’s life, however, was a nocturne shadowed by the relentless pursuit of tuberculosis, which ultimately claimed him on October 17, 1849. For 11 years, he battled the disease, pouring his soul into his music.
The essence of Chopin’s music is a beautiful paradox – it’s an intricate blend of lyrical romanticism, the rustic charm of Polish folk tunes, and awe-inspiring technical virtuosity. His legacy lives on in the dreamy realms of his nocturnes, the precision of his études, and the rhythmic grace of his waltzes. Transcending the barriers of piano, his compositions have found new life in various instruments and have gracefully waltzed into films, television shows, and commercials.
Chopin’s melodies are not just notes strung together; they are a testament to his undying love for Poland and his genius, resonating through time and continuing to stir the hearts of audiences worldwide. In Chopin’s music, we find an eternal resonance that speaks of passion, homeland, and the unquenchable spirit of creativity.
Christoff
Boris Christoff lived from 1914 until 1993. He was a bass-baritone who was born in Plovdiv, Bulgaria. He studied law in Sofia, then studied singing in Rome and Salzburg. His debut recital was in Rome in 1946. He sang at La Scala in Milan in 1947, at Covent Garden in 1949, and from 1956 in the USA.
Clementi
Muzio Clementi lived from 1752 until 1832. He was a composer and pianist who born in Rome. In 1766 he was brought to England, where he conducted the Italian Opera in London (1777–80), toured as a virtuoso pianist (1781), and went into the piano-manufacturing business. He wrote the Gradus ad Parnassum from 1817 to 1826, a piano method on which subsequent piano methods have been based. He composed mainly piano and chamber music.
Coates
Eric Coates lived from 1886 until 1957 and was the greatest British composer of light music in the 20th century, though his education never looked to be leading him in that direction. He was born in the midlands of England, in the county of Nottinghamshire, in 1886. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London, taking viola with the legendary Lionel Tertis, and composition with Frederick Corder. But it was as a violist that he earned his living, joining the famous Queen’s Hall Orchestra under Sir Henry Wood. From 1913 to 1919 he was principal viola, and a list of first British performances by that orchestra would indicate that he came into contact with all the most avant garde music of his day. Yet it was to be in the field of light music that he was to become famous.
It was the time of the radio, the BBC Light Programme with its demands for new music, and the need to brighten the country after the First World War, and above all it was the day of the ‘bright young thing’. It was the perfect scene for a composer who could produce a seemingly endless stream of easily memorable melodies. A publishing house commissioned him to write a major light music work for orchestra each year, while they were happy to take anything from him including his large output of songs.
Orchestras demanded that he conduct his own music with them, and he started a second career as a conductor of light music including many appearances with the BBC Theatre Orchestra. His music spoke to all generations, from those looking for nostalgia, to the very young, with his phantasies, ‘Cinderella’ and ‘The Three Bears’. He produced one major success after another, his music in the war years valuable to the morale of the nation, and included the stirring march for the Eighth Army to mark their Alamein victory in 1942 under General Montgomery.
Though he continued conducting his own music after the war, including definitive recordings of much of his output, his compositional career seemingly burned out. Then in a sudden flurry of activity he produced a number of fine works in his last years. That period included the Dambusters March for the film on that theme, the first time he succumbed to the many film music offers made to him.
He had so many successes, and his music became known to just about everyone in the UK, that it was thought he had a considerable output, but apart from his songs, it numbered less than fifty. Without doubt it was his training in classical music, and the years in the orchestra, that enabled him to write so fluently and so colourfully.
Sleepy Lagoon dates from 1930, but was not a huge success until an American dance orchestra turned it into a slow foxtrot. That led to the work being chosen for the opening music to the longest running radio show, Desert Island Discs, which started in 1948 and is still broadcast 50 years later. It remains probably the best known melody in the UK.
Two years later, among a number of short pieces written at this time, comes the very relaxed, Lazy Nights. Springtime Suite dates from 1937, and though its three movements never quite achieved the success of his other suites, it is one of his most skilfully constructed works. The previous year Coates met a commission from a virtuoso saxophonist for a new work. The brilliant Saxo-Rhapsody was the result. Composed in less than a month, its jaunty and jolly atmosphere so perfectly captured the nature of the instrument, while providing the soloist with a piece of unabashed showmanship.
The waltz was still the ballroom favourite, and Coates provided a number of such works, though truth to tell, they were more often played as an orchestral work than for dancing. Footlights dates from 1939, the same year that saw the little orchestral romance, Last Love.
Four Ways Suite dates from 1925, Coates looking in four directions, north, south, east and west. The north is represented by Scotland; the second movement has a distinct Italian flavour; China is the east, and flying in the face of the mood among British musicians at that time, it is jazz for the West. The disc ends with Coates’ last composition, High Flight, intended for a Warwick film of 1957.
Cohan
George M. (Michael) Cohan was an actor, singer, composer os songs such as Over There, The Yankee Doodle Boy, Give My Regards to Broadway, Mary’s a Grand Old Name, You’re a Grand Old Flag and Harrigan. He was the subject of movie called Yankee Doodle Dandy, as well as a Broadway show named George M!
There is a statue of George M. Cohan in New York.
Cole
Nat King Cole lived from 1917 until 1965. He was born Nathaniel Adams Coles in Birmingham, Alabama and raised in Chicago. Cole was a jazz pianist, singer, bandleader,for the King Cole Trio, a songwriter who wrote Straighten Up and Fly Right, an actor in St. Louis Blues, the first black entertainer to host a national TV show and the father of singer Natalie Cole.
His daughter, Natalie, became a pop music star with many hits in the 1990s – including an album of standards made popular by her father: “Mona Lisa”, “For Sentimental Reasons”, “Nature Boy”, “Too Young” and “Unforgettable”. With modern recording technology, she was able to record a duet with her father’s voice.
His first recording was in 1936. Although Cole’s commercial success as a pop artist was phenomenal, it unfortunately came with the sacrifice of his exemplary and extremely influential talents as a jazz pianist. Before he turned full-time to singing, he had already influenced the likes of Oscar Peterson, Ahmad Jamal, and Ray Charles with his intricate and innovative piano style and piano/guitar/bass lineup.
Cole’s songs included: Mona Lisa, Too Young, Unforgettable, Pretend, Ballerina, Ramblin’ Rose and The Christmas Song Cole passed away Feb 15, 1965 and was posthumously awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy in 1990.
Coleman, Cy
Born Seymour Kaufman of immigrant East European Jewish parents in the Bronx, Coleman’s first major hit was Wildcat, the 1960 musical about wildcat oil drilling that starred Lucille Ball (news) and featured the classic Hey Look Me Over. His later hits included City of Angels and Barnum.
Coleman was a self-taught jazz pianist whose career started at the age of 7 when he played a recital at Carnegie Hall.
Songs such as Witchcraft and The Best is Yet to Come were made popular by Sinatra, while another longtime collaborator was screenwriter and lyricist Adolph Green, best known for 1950s classic Singin’ in the Rain.
Coleman also worked closely with Shirley MacLaine, conceiving and co-writing her television special If My Friends Could See Me Now and creating the musical Gypsy in My Soul in 1976 that won Emmy awards for both Coleman and MacLaine.
He won three Tony Awards (news – web sites) as well as several Grammys and Emmys and an Oscar nomination for the music for the 1969 film Sweet Charity. which also starred MacLaine.
Coleman, Ornette
Ornette Coleman is a jazz musician, saxophonist and composer. He was born in 1930 in Fort Worth, Texas. His experiments in free-form improvisation sharply divided the jazz establishment upon his emergence in 1959. Largely self-taught, he played in rhythm-and-blues bands before settling in Los Angeles in 1951, where he gradually formed a quartet of musicians who were receptive to his unorthodox ideas. He first recorded in 1958 and made his New York debut the following year. He made a series of important recordings between 1959 and 1961 that shaped the direction of jazz for the next twenty years. A sporadic performing artist after the early 1960s, he occasionally led both a conventional jazz quartet and the rock band Prime Time, but turned increasingly to composition, producing several works for symphony orchestra in accordance with his “harmolodic theory.”
Copland
Aaron Copland lived between 1900 and 1990. He is considered to be a twentieth century composer.
Copland often used American folk music in his ballets, such as “Appalachian Spring”, which won a Pulitzer Prize.
Copland also wrote background music for movies and a ballet based on the story of Billy the Kid. He often used American themes in an expressive modern style, sometimes employing jazz rhythms.
Corelli
Arcangelo Corelli lived from 1653 until 1713. His contributions to the development of European music are the foundations of violin technique and creating the basic style for concerti grossi.
He spent most of his life in Rome, under the patronage of Cardinal Pietro Ottobani.
Couperin
François Couperin lived from 1668 until 1733. He was part of a famous French musical family and is most well-known for his harpsichord music.
Cowell
Henry Dixon Cowell lived from 1897 until 1965. He was a composer who was born in Menlo Park, California. Cowell was largely self-taught as pianist and composer. In his teens he gravitated to radical musical experiments including his trademark use of tone-cluster harmony. From the 1920s he pursued an international career as composer, concert promoter, and pianist, specializing in his own and others’ “ultra-modern” music; he also taught and wrote books including the 1919 New Musical Resources, and in 1927 founded the historic New Music Quarterly. In his own music, progressive ideas appear alongside traditional material; his works include 20 symphonies.
Cristofori
Bartolommeo Cristofori (1655) Italian instrument maker, credited with designing the first pianoforte, which he called “the harpsichord that plays soft and loud”.
Cruger
Johann Cruger lived from 1598 until 1662. His Now Thank We All our God was harmonized by Felix Mendelssohn.
Cugat
Xavier Cugat lived from 1900 until 1990. He was a violinist and bandleader who was born in Barcelona, Spain and raised in Cuba. He first became popular in the United States in the 1920s with his tango orchestra; in the 1930s he introduced other Latin dance rhythms including the Cuban rumba. In the 1940s he appeared in many musical films, such as You Were Never Lovelier (1942). He promoted the popularity of Latin music in the United States.
Czerny
Carl Czerny was an Austrian composer, teacher, and pianist of Czech origin whose vast musical production amounted to over a thousand works. His books of studies for the piano are still widely used in piano teaching.
Czerny is in the center top of this image. He influenced many!
. 1864 ~ Anton Schindler, German violinist and Beethoven’s biographer, died at the age of 68
. 1875 ~ First American performance of Johannes Brahms’“Hungarian Dances”
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1886 ~ Death of Italian opera composer Amilcare Ponchielli, in Milan. He was 51.
. 1891 ~ French Composer Leo Delibes died at the age of 54
. 1905 ~ Ernesto Halffter, Spanish composer and conductor
. 1908 ~ Ethel Merman (Zimmerman), American singer of popular music, Tony Award-winning actress (musical), Musical Theater Hall of Fame. She is most famous for Call Me Madam in 1951, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, There’s No Business Like Show Business and Alexander’s Ragtime Band
. 1929 ~ Marilyn Horne, American mezzo-soprano
. 1929 ~ G.T. (Granville) Hogan, Jazz drummer who played with Elmo Hope, Earl Bostic
. 1934 ~ Bob Bogle (Robert Lenard Bogle), Guitarist, bass with The Ventures
. 1938 ~ Béla Bartók and his wife, Ditta performed their first public concert featuring his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion
. 1938 ~ Benny Goodman and his band, plus a quartet, brought the sound of jazz to Carnegie Hall in New York City. When asked how long an intermission he wanted, he quipped, “I don’t know. How much does Toscanini get?”
. 1942 ~ Bill Francis, Keyboard, singer with Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show
. 1942 ~ Kay Kyser and the band recorded A Zoot Suit for Columbia Records. The tune is about the problems associated with wearing this garish, exaggerated ‘hep’ fashion.
. 1946 ~ Katia Ricciarelli, Italian soprano
. 1946 ~ Ronnie Milsap, Grammy Award-winning singer in 1976, CMA Male Vocalist of the Year (1974, 1976, 1977), CMA Entertainer of the Year (1977), blind since birth, he learned to play several instruments by age 12
. 1957 ~ Conductor Arturo Toscanini died in New York at the age of 89.
. 1957 ~ The Cavern Club opened for business in Liverpool, England. The rock club was just a hangout for commoners. Then, things changed — big time. It all started in the early 1960s when four kids from the neighborhood popped in to jam. They, of course, turned out to be The Beatles.
. 1962 ~ Paul Webb, Bass with Talk Talk
. 1964 ~ “Hello Dolly!” opened at the St. James Theatre in New York City. Carol Channing starred in the role of Mrs. Dolly Levi. The musical was an adaptation of Thornton Wilder’s play, “The Matchmaker”. The show, with an unforgettable title song, was hailed by critics as the “…possible hit of the season.” It was possible, all right. “Hello Dolly!” played for 2,844 performances. And, it returned to Broadway in the 1990s, again starring Carol Channing.
. 1972 ~ David Seville died on this day in Beverly Hills, CA. Born Ross Bagdasarian, the musician was the force, and artist, behind the Alvin and the Chipmunks novelty songs of the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s.
. 1973 ~ Clara Ward passed away. Ward was an American gospel artist who achieved great artistic and commercial success in the 1940s and 1950s.
. 1975 ~ “Mandy” is Barry Manilow’s first #1 pop hit
. 1976 ~ The album, “Frampton Comes Alive”, was released by Herb Alpert’s A&M Records. The double LP soon reached the top spot of the album charts and stayed perched there for 17 weeks. It sold 19 million copies in its first year.
. 1980 ~ Lin Manuel Miranda, American actor, composer, lyricist (Hamilton)
. 1984 ~ Michael Jackson received eight awards at the 11th annual American Music Awards this night.
. 2001 ~ Eleanor Lawrence, a flutist who played often in chamber music performances and with several orchestras in New York City, died of brain cancer at the age of 64. She is credited with transforming a simple newsletter into an important source for flutists. Lawrence studied the flute at the New England Conservatory with the principal flutist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, James Pappoutsakis. She later studied with flutists from the Philadelphia Orchestra and the Metropolitan Opera orchestra. She joined the American Symphony Orchestra and the Brooklyn Philharmonic after moving to New York in the 1960s. She played periodically with the New York Philharmonic and the Metropolitan Opera. Besides performing, Lawrence taught at the Manhattan School of Music. She served three times as the president of the New York Flute Club. She edited The National Flute Association Newsletter, now The Flutist Quarterly, from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s, expanding it from a brief information sheet to a publication with regular interviews.
On January 18, 1958 Leonard Bernstein began presenting his television series What does music mean? The series ran for 53 programs. Some of the episodes can be found below:
Part 1 What is Classical Music?
Plot: Bernstein conducts Handel’s Water Music and cites it as an indisputable example of classical music. “Exact” is the word that best defines classical music, Bernstein says and he demonstrates with musical illustrations from Bach’s Fourth Brandenburg Concerto, Mozart’s Concerto No. 21 in C Major and The Marriage of Figaro, and Haydn’s Symphony No. 102.
The decline of classical music at the end of the eighteenth century is tied to Beethoven’s innovations and the Romantic movement, and Bernstein conducts Beethoven’s Egmont Overture.
Part 2 What is Melody?
Plot: Bernstein discusses the different forms melody can take, including tune, theme, motive, melodic line and musical phrase. He illustrates by conducting the orchestra in excerpts from Tchaikovsky, Wagner, Hindemith, and Brahms.
Part 3 What is a Mode?
Plot: Bernstein discusses scales, intervals, and tones, and analyzes several pieces, including Debussy’s Fêtes, Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade, and music from the Kinks and the Beatles, to illustrate different modes.
An excerpt from Bernstein’s ballet Fancy Free is also performed.
. 1775 ~ Giovanni Battista Sammartini, composer, died
. 1890 ~ Premiere of The Sleeping Beauty, ballet by Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky. After the less-than-promising 1877 debut of Swan Lake, marred by a largely amateur production, over a decade elapsed before the composer was commissioned by the Director of the Imperial Theatres in St. Petersburg to supply music for a ballet on the Perrault fairy tale, The Sleeping Beauty. Tchaikovsky threw himself arms-deep into the project. Not only was the composer again on happy turf, but he was also currently in a state of delight by the occasional presence of a three-year-old little girl; children seemed to tap a joyful vein in Tchaikovsky. The little girl’s proximity fed a spirit of fantasy that transmitted to this most lighthearted of the composer’s scores. Most musicologists and historians concede that Sleeping Beauty is the most perfectly wrought of Tchaikovsky’s three ballet scores, classic in its restraint, yet possessing the right amount of color and panache to render it pure Tchaikovsky; its waltz remains a Pops favorite.
. 1896 ~ Alexander Scriabin made his European debut as a pianist at the Salle Erard in Paris
. 1909 ~ Gene Krupa, American Jazz bandleader and drummer
. 1919 ~ Pianist and statesman Ignace Paderewski became the first premier of Poland
. 1925 ~ Ruth Slenczynska, pianist, born in Sacramento, California
. 1941 ~ Captain Beefheart (Don Van Vliet), Singer with Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band, artist
. 1942 ~ Kenny Sargent vocalized with the Glen Gray Orchestra on Decca Records’ It’s the Talk of the Town.
. 1944 ~ Duke Ellington and His Famous Orchestra took the song “Do Nothin’ Till You Hear From Me” to the top of the charts. It was there for eight weeks before being knocked out off the top.
. 1948 ~ Ronnie Van Zandt, Singer, songwriter with Lynyrd Skynyrd
. 1964 ~ The soundtrack album of the musical, “The King and I”, starring Yul Brynner, earned a gold record.
. 1967 ~ Ed Sullivan told the Rolling Stones to change the lyrics and the title to the song, Let’s Spend the Night Together, so it became Let’s Spend Some Time Together.
. 1972 ~ Elvis Presley, who was also censored from the waist down by Ed Sullivan, reportedly drew the largest audience for a single TV show to that time. Elvis presented a live, worldwide concert from Honolulu on this day.
. 1972 ~ “American Pie” by Don McLean hit #1 on the pop charts
. 1987 ~ Ray Bolger died. He was an American entertainer of vaudeville, stage and actor, singer and dancer best known for his portrayal of the Scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz.
. 1993 ~ Sammy Cahn passed away. He was an American lyricist, songwriter and musician.
. 2018 ~ Edwin Hawkins, American gospel musician, choirmaster and composer (Oh Happy Day), died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 74
. 2019 ~ Carol Elaine Channing died at the age of 98. She was an American actress, singer, dancer and comedian. Notable for starring in Broadway and film musicals, her characters typically radiate a fervent expressiveness and an easily identifiable voice, whether singing or for comedic effect.
. 1929 ~ Billy Walker, Singer, known as the ‘masked singer’
. 1931 ~ Caterina Valente, Singer
. 1936 ~ Harriet Hilliard, vocalist and wife of bandleader Ozzie Nelson, sang Get Thee Behind Me Satan, for the movie “Follow the Fleet.” The song was originally written by Irving Berlin and was previously intended for Ginger Rogers to sing in the movie “Top Hat.”
. 1938 ~ Jack Jones (John Allan Jones), Singer, son of Allan Jones and wife, actress, Irene Hervey.
. 1939 ~ The program, “Honolulu Bound”, was heard on CBS radio. Phil Baker and The Andrews Sisters were featured on the program.
. 1949 ~ Joaquín Turina, Spanish pianist/conductor/composer (Rima), died at the age of 66
. 1956 ~ Rock ‘n’ roller, Little Richard, was singing the newly released Tutti-Frutti. The Pat Boone version became even more popular as a cover record.
. 1964 ~ A hootenanny was held for the first time at the White House, as the NewChristy Minstrels entertained President and Lady Bird Johnson, as well as Italy’s President.
. 1965 ~ Jeanette (Anna) MacDonald passed away. She was an American singer and actress best remembered for her musical films of the 1930s with Maurice Chevalier and Nelson Eddy
. 1968 ~ LL Cool J (James Todd Smith), Rap singer
. 1970 ~ Diana Ross and the Supremes perform their final concert
. 1995 ~ Alexander Gibson, British conductor and founder of the Scottish Opera, died at the age of 68
.2024 – Peter Schickele died at the age of 88. He was best known as P.D.Q. Bach and wrote a biography under that name titled Definitive Biography of P.D.Q. Bach. There’s a copy in the music studio if anyone wants to borrow it.
Peter Schickele, a virtuoso of versatility and a maestro of musical mirth, embarked on his final cadence in his home in Bearsville, N.Y. His daughter, Karla Schickele, confirmed his passing, marking the end of a vibrant era. Schickele’s health had waned following a series of infections last fall, but his legacy resonates with a crescendo of creativity and humor.
A composer of serious concert music, Schickele’s symphonic, choral, solo instrumental, and chamber works numbered over 100, enchanting audiences since the 1950s. His compositions, which graced the repertoires of the New York Philharmonic, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Lark Quartet, the Minnesota Opera, and other prestigious ensembles, reflected his deep musical prowess. His talents also shone in the realms of film scores and Broadway musicals, showcasing his versatility and profound understanding of diverse musical genres.
Yet, it was under the guise of his riotously comedic alter ego, P.D.Q. Bach, that Schickele achieved iconic status. In this whimsical persona, he masterfully blended the gravitas of classical music with the lightheartedness of parody. For over fifty years, he delighted and surprised audiences with performances that were a fantastical fusion of Mozart, the Marx Brothers, and Rube Goldberg. His prizewinning recordings and even a book-length biography of P.D.Q. Bach playfully punctured the oftentimes solemn bubble of classical-music culture, bringing a refreshing irreverence to the concert hall.
Peter Schickele’s life was a symphony of serious music and satirical comedy, leaving behind a legacy that dances between the profound and the playful, reminding us that at the heart of great art lies the joy of creation.
These are some examples of pedal marks in piano music:
An older style of pedaling. The symbols can be between or below the staves.
This type of pedaling is more commonly used today.
Another type of pedaling
Pedals on a grand piano:
There are two standard foot pedals on the piano: on the left side is the una corda pedal and on the right side is the sustain (damper) pedal.
The middle sostenuto pedal is only standard on the American grand piano, and is very rarely used.
With pedals, the pianist can add resonance and color to the music and thereby bring out its inherent emotion. At the same time, over-pedaling or improper pedaling can drown the listener and the performer in a miasma of overlapping sounds.
This pedal has various names. It is sometimes called the damper pedal (because it lifts all the dampers inside the piano), or the forte pedal (because the result of lifting all the dampers is a fuller sound), or the tre corde pedal (because it allows the three strings of each key to vibrate), or the sustaining pedal (because when you depress it the note will continue to sound even if you take your fingers off the keys).
Damper Pedaling Guidelines
Here are some guidelines pedaling. As with everything in art, they can be ignored under certain circumstances.
Avoid pedaling notes that move in a stepwise or scalar pattern. Adjacent notes are dissonant, and when pedaled, they sound smudged.
Do pedal notes that skip and form a nice harmony.
Change your pedal (i.e., lift it up and put it down again) at each change of harmony.
Avoid pedaling through rests (i.e., silence), at ends of phrases (at which point we would need to breathe and that split second of silence takes care of that), or staccato notes—although this is commonly ignored, because we actually can hear the disconnection through the pedal. This is why we do not depend on the pedal to achieve a beautiful legato.
Keep your heel planted firmly on the floor, and pedal with either toes or the ball of foot, depending on your shoe size.
There are several manipulations possible with the damper pedal, each affecting the sound slightly differently.
Syncopated Pedaling
For the cleanest sound, the syncopated (or legato) pedal will give you the most control. This is an action where the foot is put down immediately after the note is played. This may take some getting used to, but you can practice it by playing a C scale.
Play C, and then lower the damper pedal.
Hold the pedal down until you are just about ready to play the D.
As the D’s finger goes down, the foot goes up, and then down again immediately after the D is struck.
The sound is clean. Continue up the scale the same way.
As an experiment, try putting the pedal down as you play a note, and notice the difference in the sound. Since the damper pedal lifts all the dampers, when you strike the D, not only are the three strings of that note free to vibrate but so do all the other strings vibrate sympathetically. You have a sound that is full of overtones.
There are times when you will want that effect and so will keep your foot down until the accumulated sound needs to breathe.
You can practice the syncopated pedal away from the piano by sitting on the bench or a chair and lifting your right knee at exactly the same time as your right hand goes down to tap the rising knee. This is the same action at the keyboard. The foot goes up when the hand goes down and then returns to the pedal.
Partial Pedals
There are half and quarter pedals too, which are used when you don’t want full vibrato. Rather than depressing the pedal all the way down, you lower your foot halfway so that the dampers are lifted only slightly off the strings, without allowing them to vibrate fully.
The quarter pedal gives even just a hint of pedal. It will take a while to feel these various distances on your piano. Also, you will find that each piano has its own pedal feel, which you must get used to before attempting to perform on that instrument.
Flutter Pedal
Then there are times, usually in scale passages, where touches of pedal can be very appealing and then the foot goes up and down rapidly and shallowly, and that is called the “flutter” pedal.
Choosing the Pedaling
The different types of damper pedaling techniques are for you, the pianist, to decide. But what determines which choice you will make?
Two things will control that: your very important ear, and your understanding of the music—the composer and the era in which the music was composed.
Your pedaling approach following the composer’s style depends on your knowledge of what instruments were available during the composer’s lifetime and how the pedal or lack of pedals would have made the music sound. This way, your interpretation will have authenticity.
Position of the Sustain Pedal:
Right pedal
The Sustain Pedal is Played With:
Right foot
Also Called:
Damper pedal, forte pedal, loud pedal
Effects of the Sustain Pedal:
The sustain pedal allows all of the notes on the piano to resonate after the keys have been lifted, for as long as the pedal is depressed. It creates a legato effect, forcing all of the notes to echo and overlap.
History of the Sustain Pedal:
The sustain pedal was originally operated by hand, and an assistant was required to operate it until the knee lever was created. The creators of the sustain foot pedal are unknown, but it is believed to have been invented around the mid-1700s.
Use of the sustain was uncommon until the Romantic Period, but is now the most commonly used piano pedal.
How the Sustain Pedal Works:
The sustain pedal lifts the dampers off of the strings, allowing them to vibrate until the pedal is released.
Sustain Pedal Marks:
In piano notation, use of the sustain pedal begins with Ped., and ends with a large asterisk.
Variable pedal marks, seen as /_/, are placed under notes, and define the precise pattern in which the sustain pedal is depressed and released.
Horizontal lines show when the sustain pedal is depressed.
Diagonal lines indicate a quick, temporary release of the sustain pedal.
Position of the Una Corda Pedal:
Left pedal
The Una Corda is Played With:
Left foot
Also Called:
Soft pedal, “piano” pedal
Effects of the Una Corda Pedal:
The una corda pedal is used to enhance the timbre of softly played notes, and exaggerate a low volume. The soft pedal should be used with notes that are already played softly, and will not produce the desired effect on louder notes.
History of the Una Corda Pedal:
The una corda was the first mechanism to modify the piano’s sound, and was originally operated by hand. It was invented in 1722 by Bartolomeo Cristofori, and quickly became a standard addition to the piano.
How the Una Corda Pedal Works:
Most treble keys are attached to two or three strings. The una corda shifts the strings so that the hammers only strike one or two of them, creating a softened sound.
Some bass keys are only attached to one string. In this case, the pedal creates a shift so that the hammer strikes on a lesser-used portion of the string.
Una Corda Pedal Marks:
In piano notation, use of the soft pedal begins with the words una corda (meaning “one string”), and is released by the words tre corde (meaning “three strings”).
Interesting Facts About the Una Corda Pedal:
Most upright pianos use a “piano” pedal instead of a true una corda pedal. The piano pedal moves the hammers closer to the strings, preventing them from striking with full force
Position of the Sostenuto Pedal:
Usually the middle pedal, but is often omitted.
The Sostenuto is Played With:
Right foot
Originally Called:
Tone-sustaining pedal
Effects of the Sostenuto Pedal:
The sostenuto pedal allows certain notes to be sustained while other notes on the keyboard are unaffected. It is used by hitting the desired notes, then depressing the pedal. The selected notes will resonate until the pedal is released. This way, sustained notes can be heard alongside notes played with a staccato effect.
History of the Sostenuto Pedal:
The sostenuto pedal was the last addition to the modern piano. Boisselot & Sons first showcased it in 1844, but the pedal didn’t gain popularity until Steinway patented it in 1874. Today, it’s primarily found on American grand pianos, but is not considered a standard addition since it is very rarely used.
How the Sostenuto Pedal Works:
When the sostenuto pedal is depressed, it keeps the dampers off the selected strings, allowing them to resonate while the rest of the keys’ dampers remain down.
Sostenuto Pedal Marks:
In piano music, use of the sostenuto pedal begins with Sost. Ped., and ends with a large asterisk. Notes meant to be sustained are sometimes marked by hollow, diamond-shaped notes, but there are no strict rules for this pedal since it is hardly ever used.
Interesting Facts About the Sostenuto Pedal:
Sostenuto is Italian for “sustaining,” although this incorrectly describes the pedal’s function.
On some pianos, the sostenuto pedal only affects the bass notes.
The middle pedal is sometimes built as a “practice rail” pedal instead of a sostenuto. A practice rail muffles notes with felt dampers, allowing for quiet play.
Sostenuto pedal markings are rarely seen in sheet music, but can be found in the works of Claude Debussy.
. 1884 ~ Sophie Tucker (Abuza), Russian-born American burlesque and vaudeville singer
. 1904 ~ Richard Addinsell was born
More information about Addinsell
. 1909 ~ Quentin ‘Butter’ Jackson, Trombonist, played with Duke Ellington
. 1910 ~ Enrico Caruso and Emmy Destinn were heard via a telephone transmitter; rigged by DeForest Radio-Telephone Company to broadcast from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City.
. 1930 ~ Robert ‘Squirrel’ Lester, Singer with The Chi-Lites
. 1938 ~ Singer Allan Jones recorded The Donkey Serenade for Victor Records. The song became the one most often associated with the singer. Allan sang and acted in several Marx Brothers films: “A Night at the Opera”, “A Day at the Races”, but the film that catapulted him to stardom was the operetta, “Firefly”, with Jeanette MacDonald. Singer Jack Jones is the son of Allan and wife, actress Irene Hervey.
. 1941 ~ The four Modernaires joined to sing with the Glenn Miller Band on a permanent basis beginning this day. They had a ‘solo’ hit in 1946 with To Each His Own.
. 1957 ~ Elvis Presley recorded All Shook Up and That’s When Your Heartaches Begin for Victor Records in Hollywood. The former tune became Elvis’ ninth consecutive gold record.
. 1961 ~ Wayne Marshall, English pianist, organist and conductor
. 1962 ~ Singer Chubby Checker set a record, literally, with the hit, The Twist. The song reached the #1 position for an unprecedented second time – in two years. The Twist was also number one on September 26, 1960.
. 1968 ~ Johnny Cash performed live for the second time at Folsom Prison in the prison cafeteria which was recorded as the album “Johnny Cash at At Folsom Prison”.
. 2001 ~ Kenneth Haas, the former general manager of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Cleveland Orchestra, died after a long illness at the age of 57. Haas was general manager of the Boston orchestra from 1987 to 1996 and was instrumental in appointing Keith Lockhart conductor of the Boston Pops Orchestra. Haas was general manager of the Cleveland Orchestra from 1976 to 1987 after performing the same job for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in 1975. In Cleveland he established the orchestra’s chamber music and recital series.
. 2001 ~ Michael Cuccione, youngest of the five-member spoof boy band 2gether, died at age 16 from complications from Hodgkin’s disease. The teen played Jason “Q.T.” McKnight on the MTV show “2gether,” which poked fun at the boy band craze. His character had a fictional illness, “biliary thrombosis,” but Cuccione really had suffered from Hodgkin’s disease as a child and underwent five months of chemotherapy. The singer-actor set up a cancer research foundation co-wrote a book with his grandmother and appeared on “Baywatch” as a cancer victim.
Get ready to celebrate a splashing fun day – January 13 is National Rubber Ducky Day! 🎉 This quirky holiday honors none other than Rubber Duckie, the beloved bath-time buddy of Sesame Street’s Ernie and Big Bird. First waddling onto the scene in a 1970 episode, this cheerful yellow companion has been making waves ever since.
But did you know? The humble rubber ducky has a history that floats back to the late 1800s. Originally envisioned as a chew toy, it paddled through the tides of time, evolving from rubber to plastic, especially during the World Wars when rubber was as precious as gold!
The first patent for this buoyant buddy was hatched in 1928 by Landon Smart Lawrence. His ingenious design? A ducky that always bobs back to an upright position, no matter how wavy the bathwater gets! And let’s not forget the artistic touch of Russian Sculptor Peter Ganine, who sculpted a duck that’s pretty much the doppelganger of our modern rubber duckies.
Fast forward to 2001, and the rubber ducky makes a royal splash in Britain. Why? The Sun revealed that even Queen Elizabeth II had a rubber duck in her bathroom – and it wore an inflatable crown! 👑
The crowning moment for these cheerful chirpers came in 2013 when the rubber ducky was inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame, joining an exclusive club of only 52 other toys.
So, on January 13, grab your rubber ducky and let’s quack open the celebrations for this iconic, floaty friend! 🦆💦🎈
The now world-famous giant rubber duck, by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, has sailed into the Port of Los Angeles. The six-story-tall bath toy has made its west coast debut to take part in their Tall Ships Festival parade. The duck has also appeared in Australia, Belgium, Japan, New Zealand and Brazil. Earlier this year, versions of the massive inflatable duck were in Asia, including Beijing’s harbor and Taiwan, where the duck actually exploded and fell apart while on display. Report by Sarah Kerr.
Did you know that the City of Fairfax Regional Library has a Rubber Ducky collection?
Go on a scavenger hunt to discover more than 200 ducks hiding throughout the building and are on display. The Rubber Ducky is the library’s mascot.
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