Calendar Search Results: ding song
January 29, 1961 Five days after arriving in New York from Minnesota, Bob Dylan meets his ailing folk hero, Woody Guthrie, tracking him down in East Orange, New Jersey. Dylan pays tribute with "Song To Woody," which appears on his first album the following year.More
January 19, 1961 The night before John F. Kennedy's inauguration, Frank Sinatra throws a star-studded gala to eradicate the Democratic Party's $2 million campaign debt. With the help of Peter Lawford, fellow Rat Packer and husband of JFK's sister Patricia, Sinatra enlists elite entertainers for the evening, including Nat King Cole, Harry Belafonte, Gene Kelly, Ethel Merman, and actors Laurence Olivier, Janet Leigh, Tony Curtis, and Bette Davis.More
October 15, 1960 The famous lineup of The Beatles records together for the first time when Ringo Starr replaces an ailing Pete Best as the group backs up Rory Storm and the Hurricanes guitarist Wally Eymond on a recording of George Gershwin's "Summertime."
June 20, 1960 John Taylor (bassist for Duran Duran) is born Nigel John Taylor in Solihull, Warwickshire, England. As well as co-founding Duran Duran he later achieves a second round of success in rock supergroup The Power Station.
May 30, 1960 Stephen Duffy is born in Alum Rock, Birmingham, England. A founding member of Duran Duran, he leaves the band shortly before they are signed to EMI. He later finds moderate success as a solo artist under the name Stephen "Tin Tin" Duffy with the song "Kiss Me."
May 10, 1960 Paul Hewson is born in Dublin. He shortens his nickname from Bono Vox (Latin for "good voice") to simply Bono and fronts the band U2.More
May 9, 1960 The birth control pill is introduced in the US, inspiring Loretta Lynn to sing a song about it.More
April 3, 1960 Working at RCA's Studio B in Nashville, Elvis Presley pulls an all-nighter, recording nine songs, finishing with "Are You Lonesome Tonight" in the wee hours of the morning. The mournful song becomes one of his biggest hits, going to #1 in America for six weeks.
March 25, 1960 In Nashville, Roy Orbison records "Only The Lonely." His first big hit, it sets the stage for more heart-rending songs from Orbison like "Crying" and "In Dreams."
February 3, 1960 Frank Sinatra launches the first fully artist-owned label, Reprise Records (pronounced "repreeze"), so he can own his own masters. Some of his cohorts, including Dean Martin and Rosemary Clooney, join the label, which is sold to Warner Brothers in 1963, where it becomes home to a number of famous acts, including Jimi Hendrix, Joni Mitchell and Green Day.
October 23, 1959 "Weird Al" Yankovic is born Alfred Matthew Yankovic in Downey, California, and raised in Lynwood. He's an architecture student at California Polytechnic State University in 1979 when he gets the idea to spoof The Knack hit "My Sharona" as "My Bologna," leading to a career as the top parody artist in history.More
October 5, 1959 Bobby Darin's swinging version of "Mack the Knife," a song about a killer from The Threepenny Opera, hits #1 on the Hot 100 and stays there for an astonishing nine weeks. Darin, who is known for lighter fare like "Splish Splash," gains a more adult following, putting him on par with Frank Sinatra.More
July 10, 1959 Sandy West is born Sandy Pesavento in Long Beach, California. Together with Joan Jett, she is a founding member of the teenage all-female rock band The Runaways, playing drums. After the band splits she leaves the music industry, and dies at the age of 47 from lung cancer.
April 27, 1959 Sheena Easton is born in Glasgow, Scotland, the youngest of six children. She wins the Best New Artist Grammy in 1981 and has a string of hits that decade, including "Morning Train (Nine To Five)" and the Bond theme "For Your Eyes Only."
March 13, 1959 An emergency plane landing in a South Bend, Indiana, field nearly kills The Kingston Trio's band members.
February 27, 1959 Johnny Van Zant is born in Jacksonville, Flordia. He performs and records with the Johnny Van Zant Band and as a solo artist, but is best known for succeeding his deceased brother Ronnie Van Zant as frontman for Lynyrd Skynyrd in 1987.
February 3, 1959 Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson are killed in a plane crash. Don McLean would call it "The Day the Music Died" in his 1971 hit "American Pie."More
January 22, 1959 Buddy Holly makes his last recordings alone with an acoustic guitar in his Greenwich Village apartment. Songs include "Peggy Sue Got Married," "Crying, Waiting, Hoping," "That's What They Say," "What to Do," "Learning the Game" and "That Makes it Tough." The rough versions are overdubbed and released after his death.
December 27, 1958 While attending a class at the Liverpool College of Art, John Lennon meets student Cynthia Powell, later to become his first wife.
December 22, 1958 The Chipmunks hit #1 on the Hot 100 with the squeaky-clean festive favorite "The Chipmunk Song." It's the last Christmas song to top the chart until "All I Want For Christmas Is You" 61 years later in 2019.More
December 11, 1958 Mötley Crüe bass player Nikki Sixx is born Frank Feranna Jr. in San Jose, California. He's the main songwriter in the band; all of their hits (excluding their cover of "Smokin' In The Boy's Room") he writes either on his own or with other members of the group.
October 21, 1958 At Pythian Temple studios in New York City, Buddy Holly does what will be his last studio session, recording the tracks "True Love Ways," "It Doesn't Matter Any More," "Moondreams" and "Raining In My Heart."
September 27, 1958 Pop singer/actor Shaun Cassidy is born in Los Angeles, California. Although he doesn't join The Partridge Family cast with mom Shirley Jones and half-brother David Cassidy, he stars on The Hardy Boys Mysteries and lands a trio of Top 10 hits in 1977 - including the chart-topper "Da Doo Ron Ron."
July 30, 1958 Kate Bush is born in Bexleyheath, Kent, England. At 19, she releases her debut single, "Wuthering Heights," which goes to #1 in the UK.More
March 17, 1958 The first "Greatest Hits" compilation is released, and it's by Johnny Mathis. It's a huge hit, and the format catches on quickly. The Mathis album stays in the Billboard 200 album chart for over nine years, a record not broken until Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon.More
March 14, 1958 The RIAA issues their first Gold Single for sales of a million copies, which goes to Perry Como's "Catch A Falling Star." Record labels have been awarding their own artists Gold records for years, starting with Glenn Miller's "Chattanooga Choo Choo" in 1942, but this is the first RIAA official certification.
December 25, 1957 Shane MacGowan is born in Pembury, Kent, England, to Irish parents. In 1982 he forms The Pogues, blending Celtic music with punk. Fittingly, their most famous tune is a Christmas song: "Fairytale of New York."
December 11, 1957 In what remains one of the most shocking celebrity scandals, Jerry Lee Lewis marries 13-year-old Myra Gale Brown, who was the daughter of his cousin (and bass player), J.W. Brown. The marriage lasts 14 years but seriously damages Lewis' career.More
November 24, 1957 Chris Hayes, lead guitarist for Huey Lewis & the News from 1979–2001, is born in Great Lakes, Illinois. He co-writes some of the band's biggest hits, including "I Want A New Drug" and "The Power of Love."
October 7, 1957 The idea of expanding his gospel album into a Christmas album works out well when Elvis Presley's Elvis' Christmas Album earns pre-orders of 500,000 copies, going Gold before it is even released. It eventually becomes the best-selling Christmas album of all time.
©2026 Songfacts®, LLC