26 APRIL
In Music History
1942 '60s teen idol Bobby Rydell is born Robert Louis Ridarelli in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1941 R&B singer Claudine Clark, known for composing and performing the 1952 hit "Party Lights," is born in Macon, Georgia.
1940 Synthpop pioneer Giorgio Moroder is born in Italy. As Donna Summer's producer, he crafts a disco sound on hits like "I Feel Love" and "Bad Girls" that elevates her to queen of the genre. In the '80s he writes and produces the soundtrack hits "Flashdance... What a Feeling" and "Danger Zone."
1938 Twang guitar pioneer Duane Eddy is born in Corning, New York. His signature staccato riff powers hits like "Rebel Rouser" and "Because They're Young," and influences acts like The Ventures and The Shadows.
1938 Maurice Williams of Maurice Williams & the Zodiacs is born in Lancaster, South Carolina. He writes their #1 hit "Stay" as well as another doo-wop classic: "Little Darlin'" by The Diamonds.
1925 Jazz and pop guitarist Jorgen Ingmann is born in Copenhagen, Denmark.
1915 Blues singer and guitarist Johnny Shines is born in Frayser, Memphis, Tennessee.
1913 13-year-old Mary Phagan is found murdered in the basement of a pencil factory in Atlanta, Georgia. Her death inspires the song "Little Mary Phagan."
1886 Blues singer Ma Rainey is born Gertrude Malissa Nix Pridgett in Columbus, Georgia.
Van Halen Succeeds With Sammy
1986Van Halen prove there is life after David Lee Roth as their album 5150, their first with Sammy Hagar, hits #1 in the US for the first of three weeks.
Read more26 APRIL
Featured Events
2013 Country singer George Jones dies at age 81 from hypoxic respiratory failure, just a couple weeks after his final concert in Knoxville, Tennessee.
2003 The Morgan Creek Bridge in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, is renamed the James Taylor Bridge in honor of the singer, who mentioned it in his song "Copperline."
1994 Live release their third album, Throwing Copper. It very slowly finds an audience as radio stations and MTV warm to tracks like "Lightning Crashes" and "I Alone." The album goes to #1 in America a year after its release and sells over 8 million copies.
1978 The Last Waltz, director Martin Scorsese's acclaimed documentary of The Band's star-studded last concert, opens in theaters. The film features performances by Neil Young, Eric Clapton, Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, Neil Diamond, The Staple Singers and Dr. John.More
1977 The most famous club of the disco era, Studio 54, opens for business at 254 West 54th Street in New York City. Over the next three years, celebrity guests include Cher, Elton John, Michael Jackson, Brooke Shields, and Liza Minnelli. Donald Trump and his wife, Ivana, attend on opening night.
1977 Jim Steinman's play Neverland opens at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. Five months later, three of the songs he wrote for the production appear on Meat Loaf's seminal album Bat Out Of Hell, which would become one of the 10 best-selling albums of all time.
1969 Walter Carlos's album Switched-On Bach, notable for being the first successful album to remix classical music compositions on the newly-invented Moog synthesizer, reaches #10 on the Billboard Albums chart. The popularity of the album is the commercial breakthrough for Moog synthesizers, which go on to be part of the soundtrack in the films Tron, The Shining, and A Clockwork Orange. This in part brings synthesized music to mainstream popularity, paving the way for disco (especially the 'hi-NRG' style) in the '70s.
1969 "Oh Happy Day" by The Edwin Hawkins Singers enters the Hot 100 at #72, becoming the first pure gospel song to make that chart. More
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