23 AUGUST
In Music History
1951 Rock vocalist Jimi Jamison (of Survivor) is born in rural Mississippi. Also known for singing and co-writing the theme for the action series Baywatch.
1949 Rick Springfield is born Richard Lewis Springthorpe in South Wentworthville, New South Wales, Australia. Before becoming a pop star, he plays Dr. Noah Drake on the soap opera General Hospital.
1946 Rock singer Jim Sohns (of The Shadows Of Knight) is born in Chicago, Illinois. The band is known for their popular 1966 cover of Them's song "Gloria."
1946 Keith Moon (drummer for The Who) is born in Wembley, London, England.
1942 Doo-wopper Tony "Spaghetti" Micale (lead singer for The Reflections) is born in The Bronx, New York. Known for the 1964 hit single "(Just Like) Romeo and Juliet."
1942 Songwriter/producer Roger Greenaway is born in Fishponds, Bristol, Gloucestershire. Known for collaborations with Roger Cook, including "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing (In Perfect Harmony)," which started out as a Coca-Cola jingle.
1941 Pete Shannon (bass player for The Nashville Teens) is born in Antrim, County Antrim, Northern Ireland.
1936 R&B singer Rudy Lewis (of The Drifters) is born Charles Rudolph Harrell in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1917 Country/Western swing musician Tex Williams is born Sollie Paul Williams in Ramsey, Illinois. Known for the 1947 novelty song "Smoke! Smoke! Smoke! (That Cigarette)."
1913 Bob Crosby, Dixieland bandleader and swing singer (of the Bob-Cats), is born in Spokane, Washington. He is one of seven siblings, one of them another famous entertainer: Bing Crosby.
1912 Song-and-dance man Gene Kelly is born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
1899 Dwight Hamilton Baldwin, manufacturer of the Baldwin Piano, dies in Cincinnati, Ohio, at age 78.
Call Him Dr. May
2007Brian May of Queen gets a degree from London's Imperial College. It's not one of those honorary degrees either - he earned a PhD in astrophysics. He would have gotten it sooner, but he was busy being a rock star.
Read more23 AUGUST
Featured Events
2008 Madonna starts her Sticky & Sweet Tour (supporting her album Hard Candy) with a show at Cardiff, Wales. Her first excursion under her Live Nation contract, it breaks the record she set on her 2006 Confessions Tour for biggest-selling tour by a solo artist: the 85 dates earn about $408 million, second only to The Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang Tour at $558 million.
1994 Jeff Buckley's first and only album, Grace, is released to critical acclaim.More
1994 For no apparent reason the British duo The KLF burn £1 million on the Isle of Jura in Scotland.More
1974 John Lennon claims to see a UFO from his New York apartment. He describes it as an archetypal flying saucer, surrounded by lights with a red one on top. In his next album, Walls and Bridges, he includes this note in the booklet: "On the 23rd August 1974 at 9 o'clock I saw a U.F.O. - J.L."
1973 With salsa music hot in New York City, the label Fania Records showcases its acts at a concert in Yankee Stadium that draws a crowd of 63,000. Willie Colón, Johnny Pacheco and Larry Harlow are among the performers.
1970 Lou Reed plays his last gig with The Velvet Underground at the club Max's Kansas City in New York. His father brings him home to Long Island and puts him to work in his accounting firm, where he stays for two years before signing a solo deal.
1963 In the UK, The Beatles release "She Loves You," which becomes the best-selling UK single of all time, a record that isn't broken until 1977, when Paul McCartney releases "Mull Of Kintyre."
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