BIRTHDAYS
1965     Steven Adler, drums, b. Cleveland, OH, USA. Member group: 'Guns n' Roses'. Interestingly, Adler was the first member of 'Guns n' Roses' to be fired by singer/leader Axl Rose. Axl then continued to 'fire' band members one by one until he was the only remaining original member left in attendance by the late 1990s. Later, Adler successfully sued "G N' R" for "wrongful termination", and he also served a little jail time for assaulting two women (separate cases).
1943     Maarten Altena, Bass, b. Amsterdam, Netherlands
1913     Sid Bass, Leader, b. New York, NY, USA. d. June 19, 1993, Putney, VT, USA.
1917     Albert J. "Pud" Brown, Reeds, b. Wilmington, DE, USA. d. May 27, 1996. Age: 79.
1943     Tony Campise, Alto-soprano-baritone-tenor sax, flute, vocals, b. Houston, TX, USA.
1935     Sam Cooke, singer-songwriter/producer, b. Clarksdale, MS, USa, d. Dec. 11, 1964, Los Angeles, CA, USA. Member of The Soul Stirrers and others.
1957     Jim Denley, alto and tenor sax, flute, drums, vocal, b. Bulli, Australia
1938     Bill Emerson, C&W vocals/guitar. né: William Hundley Emerson. Member: The Country Gentlemen
1944     David Evans, guitar/keyboards/songwriter, b. Orange county CA, USA. (Currently living on island of Guam.)
CAUTION: There are two other 'David Evans''. Do not confuse this David Evans with Dr. David Evans (b. Boston, MA, USA), -a noted blues scholar and musician who has documented some of the remaining vestiges of traditional Blues in the Memphis, TN, and surrounding area. Dr. Evans heads the doctorate program in Ethnomusicology at the University of Memphis, and additionally is the author of "Big Road Blues".
Also do not confuse with the guitarist David Evans (b. Nova Scotia, Canada), who currently (2004) tours Canada with singer-songwriter Tommy John Ehman ( Craik, Saskatchewan, Canada), as part of the duo "Idle Rains".
And, finally, there is a David Evans, (b. August 8, 1961, East London, England), a former member of the band "U2".
1941     Bennie Fields, C&W singer-songwriter/guitar, b. Kermit, WV, USA. Member: "The Fields Brothers Marvelous Medicine Show", Formed: 1968 and comprised of Bennie (b. Kermit, Mingo County, West VA, USA) and Clancy (b. February 11, 1950, Kermit, Mingo County, West VA, USA, Tenor Vocals, Bass Fiddle, Guitar, Songwriter, Mandolin)
1952     Milo Fine, drums, piano. In 1969, the 'Milo Fine Free Jazz Ensemble' was founded as 'Blue Freedom' by Milo Fine, Scott Munsell and Steve Dokken.
1981     Willa Ford, vocals, b. Tampa Bay, FL, USA. née:Amanda Lee Williford.
1969     Marc Gay, vocals. Member group: 'Shai', a group consisting of R&B/Pop singers Carl Martin (b. Aug. 29, 1970), Marc Gay (b. Jan. 22, 1969), Garfield A. Bright (b. Oct. 12, 1969) and Darnell Van Rensalier (b. May 17, 1970
1952     Teddy Gentry, C&W bassist, b. Ft. Payne, AL, USA. Member group: 'Alabama', a grpup led by lead singer/rhythm guitarist/songwriter Randy Owen; his cousin, bass player/songwriter/harmony vocalist Teddy Gentry; their distant cousin, multi-instrumentalist, singer-songwriter Jeff Cook; and drummer Mark Herndon. Alabama is the longest-lasting hitmaker on today's country music scene. With 58 million in worldwide sales, the group ranks 9th biggest selling group of all time, placing them ahead of 'Led Zeppelin', 'The Doors', 'Queen', 'The Beach Boys', 'Pink Floyd' and 'The Who'. The band is second only to Conway Twitty as having the most No. 1 records in all of music. (If one counts only solo chart-toppers (excluding duets), then Alabama reigns supreme.)
1940     Addie "Micki" Harris, vocals, d. June 10, 1982. Member of 'The Shirelles' (A "Doo Wop" vocal Group)
1921     André Hodeir, Critic, writer, composer, arranger, b. Paris, France
1962     Michael Hutchence, Rock vocals, b. Sydney, Australia, d. Nov. 22, 1997, Sydney, Australia (apparent suicide. Found hanged with his leather belt) Member group: 'INXS' (1997)
1924     J. J. Johnson, Trombone, b. Indianapolis, IN, USA, d. Feb. 4, 2001, age 77. né: James Louis Johnson
1955     Phillip Johnston, alto/tenor/soprano saxes
1938     Ekkehard Jost Baritone and Bass Sax/Contrabass Clarinet. b. Germany. This proponent of "Free Jazz" (and Third World Music), also owns his own record label: Fish Music, Georg-Philipp-Gail-Str. 10,35394 Giessen, Germany; tel/fax: +49 641 47523. The small label averages one release a year. Less than ten recordings in the catalog featuring, along with Jost, Tony Oxley, Frank Gratkowski, Dieter Glawischnig and many others. Often leads his own Nonette.
1909     "Big" Ed Lewis, Trumpet, b. Eagle City, OK, USA. d. Sept. 18, 1985
1914     Dickie McBride, C&W bandleader, b. New Baden, TX, USA.
1947     Malcolm McLaren, manager/performer, b. Great Britain. In the mid 1970s as a young man not yet thirty, Malcolm McLaren owned and operated a London shop called "Sex". McLaren brought together John Lydon ("Johnny Rotten") and "Sid Vicious", forming a group who became the English punk rock legend "The Sex Pistols", with McLaren as their manager. The Sex Pistols soon became the premier punk rock band of the late 1970s. In the 1980s, McLaren became performing artist himself.
1908     Teddy ("Mr. Bear") McRae, Tenor Saxophone, b. Philadelphia, PA, USA. d. Mar. 4, 1999. USA
1943     Pete Minger, trumpet/flugelhorn, b. Orangeburg, South Carolina, USA, d. April 13, 2000. Pete was first introduced to jazz music by his brother, James. Both had learned piano from their mother, Vivian. Subsequently, Pete began to play the saxophone, but soon chose trumpet and flugelhorn as his main instrument. (In the 1960s, he played trumpet while serving in the U. S.Army.) He will perhaps always be recalled for his 10 year stint touring the world with the Count Basie Orchestra (Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis hired him).
1965     Regina Nicks, C&W singer, Houston, TX, USA, Member group: 'Regina Regina', a duo formed of Regina Leigh, the blond, and Nicks, the brunette. 'Regina Regina' evolved out of a close friendship which began when both were working for famed C&W vocalist Reba McEntire.
1908     Hammie Nixon, harmonica, b. Brownsville, TN, USA. Nixon helped to pioneer the use of the harmonica as an accompaniment instrument in bands. Orphaned at a young age, he was raised by foster parents. In the 1920s, he began his career as a professional harmonica, kazoo, guitar and jug player. For more than 50 years, he performed with Sleepy John Estes, -first recording with Estes in 1929 for the Victor label. Hammie also recorded with such other groups as Little Buddy Doyle, Lee Green, Charlie Pickett and Son Bonds.
1922     Gene Norman, producer/promoter/label owner/club owner
1912     Harry Parry, Jazz Clarinet/Saxophone/Vocals/Composer, b. Bangor, Wales, England. d. Oct. 18, 1956.
1949     Nigel Pegrum, drums/percussion/woodwinds, b. ?Worcestershire, England. Member group: 'Steeleye Span'.
1949     J. P. Pennington, Pop/Country singer-songwriter, b. Berea, KY, USA. Co-founder: "Exile", Formed 1963. Pennington is the son of Lily May Ledford, -one of the "Coon Creek Girls". CAUTION: Do not confuse with Ray Pennington (né: Ramon Daniel Pennington, b. 1933, Clay County, KY, USA. C&W singer-songwriter/guitar).
1953     Steve Perry, vocals, b. Hanford, CA, USA. Member group: 'Journey'
1927     Douglas Elijah Quattlebaum, Blues vocals/guitar, b. Florence, SC, USA. All during the 1940s, he was touring and singing with various 'Gospel' groups, including the Bells of Joy. In 1952, the Gotham label recorded him as a solo Blues singer. In 1961, he was re-discovered in Philadelphia, PA, where he would often sing and play the Blues over the public address system of his ice-cream van. Accordingly, the title of his last recording, "Softee Man Blues" was quite appropriate. Quattlebaum was a forceful singer and guitarist who, early on, had been influenced by another 'Bluesman', -"Blind Boy" Fuller.
1924     Sid Ramin, arranger/composer, b. Boston, MA, USA.
1909     Irving "Mouse" Randolph, trumpet, b: St. Louis, MO, USA. d. Dec. 12, 1997, CA, USA. Debuted with the Fate Marable orch., working the Mississippi riverboats. 1931-'33 in Kansas City with Andy Kirk Orch.; 1934 in NYC with Fletcher Henderson orch., and with Benny Carter. 1935-'39 with Cab Calloway band in NYC. In 1939, he joined Ella Fitzgerald's orch, which she had taken over when Chick Webb died. He stayed for two years until band broke up. In 1943 with Don Redman band at the Zanzibar Club NYC. Worked with Edmond Hall at NY Cafe Society (both uptown and downtown) for several years. In early 1950s with Marcellino Guerra touring Latin America. In 1955 wuth Bobby Medera at Savoy Ballroom, In 1957-'60 with Chick Morrison at La Martinique Club in NYC.
1945     Fred Selden, Alto Saxophone/flute/clarinet, b. Los Angeles, CA, USA. né: Fred Laurence Selden.
1921     Charles "Charlie" Short, Jazz Bass, b. Wales, UK. d. April 22, 1998 at 77
1939     Alan Silva, Bass/violin/cello/piano/midi keyboard/viola/vibes/vocals (also took trumpet lessons from Donald Byrd), b. Bermuda né: Alan Treadwell Silva.
1932     Teddy Smith, Bass, b. Washington, DC, USA. d. Aug. 24, 1979, USA. Worked with Horace Silver
1909     Ann Sothern, Actress/vocals. b. Valley City, ND, USA. d. March 15, 2001, Ketcham, ID (Heart failure, age 92). née: Harriette Lake. (Her sister, Bonnie Lake, sang with such bands as Jack Jenney and Artie Shaw.) Her businessman father deserted the family when she was about 6, and she was raised by her mother, an opera singer and diction coach. By age 18 she was already acting as an extra in the 'Silents' and was in a very early "soundie" musical film, "The Show of Shows". She made her Broadway debut, as a chorine, in the Florenz Ziegfeld show 'Smiles'. By 1933, she was under contract at Columbia Pictures (studio boss Harry Cohn changed her name to Ann Sothern). Throughout the 1930s she appeared in many Columbia and RKO musicals, comedies and dramas, including "The Hell Cat," "Eight Bells" and "Smartest Girl in Town." These parts earned the nickname "Queen of the Bs". But in 1939, she starred in the first of what would become a very popular Series of 'Maisie' Films. These films were so profitable for MGM that, when Sothern asked out after No. 6, studio chief Louis B. Mayer said, "Too bad, honey, your pictures pay for our mistakes, so you just stay in 'em." The films became so well known that fans could reach Sothern by addressing their letters to "Maisie, USA." In the 1941 film, "Lady Be Good," the beautiful blonde petite actress with a "zaftig" figure sang the Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein Academy Award-winning song, "The Last Time I Saw Paris." In 1999, New York's Museum of Modern Art honored her with a retrospective showcasing of 11 of her films, including "Folies Bergere" (1935) with Maurice Chevalier, Joseph L. Mankiewicz's "A Letter to Three Wives", (1949) and the MGM chiller "Shadow on the Wall" (1950). Still, she was to find her broadest audience on television, where she first played Susie, the meddlesome secretary of a talent agent played by Don Porter in "Private Secretary", which ran on CBS from 1953 to 1957. During 1958 to 1961, she was back at CBS playing assistant hotel manager Katy O'Connor in "The Ann Sothern Show". The late Lucille Ball, an old friend who guest-starred as Lucy Ricardo in the first episode of the Sothern show said "The best comedian in this business, bar none, is Ann Sothern". Sothern earned five Emmy nominations and a Golden Globe for her work on the two shows. Underappreciated by Hollywood, Sothern retired in 1984, moving to Idaho, one of her favorite vacation spots. In 1987, she told the New York Times "Hollywood doesn't respond to a strong woman, not at all. I was too independent. How dare a woman be competitive or produce her own shows?" At the time she was awaiting the release of "The Whales of August," a story based on an island off the coast of Maine, USA. The tale, that starred Lillian Gish and Bette Davis as two elderly sisters and Sothern as their vivacious neighbor, was about the coming to terms with old age. It was Sothern's first feature film since breaking her back in a stage accident in 1976. Hearing that Sothern had been cast as Gish's best friend Tisha, Davis said: "She's a good actress--she could steal the picture." Of the small cast, only Sothern garnered an Oscar nomination. She made no more films after "Whales.." Her first marriage, to actor Roger Pryor, ended in divorce in 1942. In 1943, she married actor Robert Sterling, with whom she had a child, the actress Tisha Sterling. She was divorced from Sterling in 1949.
1934     Nolan Strong, vocals, b. Scottsboro, AL, USA. Member: 'The Diablos'
1933     Margie Sullivan, Bluegrass Vocals, née: Margie Louise Brewster) Member: Sullivan Family
1895     Eva Taylor, vocals, b. St. Louis, MO, USA, d. Oct. 31, 1977
1949     Cooper Terry, harmonica, b. San Antonio, TX, USA.
1935     "Big Ed" Thompson, guitar, b. Bethlehem, GA, USA.
1900     Juan Tizol, trombone/composer, b. San Juan, Puerto Rico, d. April 23, 1984, Inglewood, CA, USA. né: Vincente Martinez Tizol. Came to U.S. in 1920 and found work with Bobby Lee's Cotton Pickers and also in How ard Theatre pit band (D.C.) In Sept. 1929, joined the Duke Ellington band staying until 1944. Then played with the Harry James orchestra except for '51-3 when he rejoined Ellington. While with the Ellington band (his most important work), he either wrote alone or in concert with the Duke, such tunes as: "Perdido"; "Pyramid"; "Conga Brava"; "Bakiff"; "Keb-Lah"; "Moonlight Fiesta"; and "Caravan". All through the 1930s, his valve trombone work was an important part of the Ellington band's repertoire.
1943     Michael Urbaniak, violin, soprano and tenor sax, keyboards, arranger, b. Warsaw, Poland
1933     Jean-Louis Viale, Drums, b. Neuilly-Sur-Seine, France, d. May 10, 1984
1948     Otto Waalkes, singer/comedian, b. East-Frisia, Germany.
1940     Eberhard Weber, Bass/Leader/Composer, b. Stuttgart, Germany
1908     Melle Weersma, Bandleader/Arranger/composer, b. Harlingen, Netherlands
1980     Lizz Wright, singer-songwriter, b, Hahira, GA, USA.

         Notable Events occuring this date include:
1965.    "Papa John" Joseph, bass, died in New Orleans, LA, USA. Age: 87.
1975.    Johannes Rediske, guitar, 1926 died
1980.    Ed Garland, bass, died in Los Angeles, California. USA.
1982.    Tommy Tucker, guitar, died in Newark, NJ, USA. Age: 48
1982.    "Big" Leon Brooks, harmonica, died in Chicago, IL, USA. Age: 48
1984.    Dill Jones, Welsh stride pianist, died in New York, NY, USA (throat Cancer) Age: 60.
1988.    Lee Robinzine, Blues vocals, died in Haven, MS, USA. Age: 64
1889.    The Columbia Phonograph Company was formed in Washington, DC, USA.
1999.    Jimmy Day, Western Swing steel guitarist, died Houston, TX, USA. Age: 65
2001.    Jean-Pierre Catoul, violin, keyboards, composer, died
2004.    Milt Bernhart, trombone, died in Glendale, California, USA
2004.    Billy May, arranger, leader,trumpet, died in San Juan Capistrano, California, USA.
2007.    Al Baculis, clarinet, alto and tenor sax, leader, died in Seminole, Florida, U.S.A. Age: 76.
2007.    Floyd Standifer, trumpet, flugelhorn, tenor sax, vocal, died in Seattle, WA, USA. Age:78.
2006.    Janette Carter, vocals/autoharp, the last surviving child of members of the original 'Carter Family', died in Kingsport, TN, USA. Age: 82. (Several chronic illnesses as well as Parkinson's disease). Ms. Carter's parents, A.P. and Sara Carter, joined with Maybelle Carter to comprise, 'The Carter Family', now known as "The First Family of Country Music."
2006.    Rick van der Linden, keyboard/composer, perhaps best recalled for his work in the band 'Ekseption', died in Hoogeveen, Netherlands. Age: 59. (stroke) (b. August 5, 1946, d. Jan. 22, 2006)

         Songs Recorded/Released this date include:
       1962    "I Left My Heart In San Francisco", - Tony Bennett vocal.
       1966    Lightin' Strikes, - Lou Christie
       1966    Uptight (Everything's Alright), -Stevie Wonder
       1972    Hurting Each Other, - The Carpenters
       1972    Joy, - Apollo 100
       1972    Precious & Few, - Climax
       1977    Dancing Queen, - Abba
       1977    Go Your Own Way, - Fleetwood Mac
       1977    Year Of The Cat, -Al Stewart
       1983    Hungry Like The Wolf, - Duran Duran
       1983    Twilight Zone, - Golden Earring
       1983    You Are, -Lionel Richie