Pick a Day

22 OCTOBER

In Music History

1964 TobyMac is born Kevin Michael McKeehan in Fairfax, Virginia. Before launching his solo career, he forms DC Talk, the first popular contemporary Christian music group to blend rap and rock.

1964 The Who (who are calling themselves the High Numbers at that time) audition for EMI Records, who choose not to sign them to a record deal.

1961 Chubby Checker performs a medley of "The Twist" and "Let's Twist Again" on TV's Ed Sullivan Show, sparking chart revivals for both tunes ("The Twist" even returns to #1).

1946 Eddie Brigati (singer/tambourine player for The Young Rascals) is born in Garfield, New Jersey.

1945 Guitarist Leslie West (of Mountain) is born Leslie Weinstein in New York City.

1942 Rock singer Bobby Fuller, known for his hit "I Fought The Law" with his group The Bobby Fuller Four, is born in Baytown, Texas, but raised in Salt Lake City, Utah.

1942 Pop singer and Mouseketeer Annette Funicello is born in Utica, New York.

1925 Singer-songwriter Dory Previn is born Dorothy Langan in New Jersey. She writes the lyrics to many movie song compositions from her second husband, André Previn.

1854 James Bland is born in Flushing, New York. While minstrel shows in the US were dominated by men in blackface, the African American artist would surpass them as "The World's Greatest Minstrel Man."

1832 Conductor and composer Leopold Damrosch is born in Posen, King of Prussia. The violinist would earn a PhD in medicine to appease his parents before turning his focus completely to music.