Music History Events: Music and Religion
October 25, 1992 The "Sinead Brigade," a group supporting Sinéad O'Connor, who tore up a picture of the Pope on Saturday Night Live a few weeks earlier, protests outside of St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York, where Cardinal John O'Connor is holding mass. Wearing masks of O'Connor, they mimic her display by tearing up photos of the Pope.
July 21, 1976 Cat Stevens' brother David gives him a copy of the Quran, leading him down a spiritual path that finds him converting to Islam the following year and changing his name to Yusuf Islam.
June 17, 1972 "Jesus Music" (later known as Christian contemporary) takes center stage at Billy Graham's Explo '72 in Dallas, where acts like Larry Norman and Love Song perform along with Kris Kristofferson, Johnny Cash, and Andrae Crouch. Graham calls it the "Christian Woodstock."
April 10, 1868 Johannes Brahms' German Requiem is premiered in Bremen Cathedral as part of the Good Friday remembrance.
March 23, 1743 George Frideric Handel's "Messiah" has its London premiere at the Covent Garden Theatre. It is not well received as the press feels that the work's subject matter is too exalted to be performed in a theatre, particularly by secular singer-actresses such as Susanna Cibber and Kitty Clive.
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