What Happened Today In Music

March 28th

1958 - Buddy Holly

Buddy Holly kicked off the first night of a 43 date tour at Brooklyn Paramount Theatre in Brooklyn, New York. The Alan Freed’s Big Beat Show also featured Jerry Lee Lewis, Chuck Berry, Frankie Lymon, The Diamonds, Billy Ford, Danny & The Juniors, The Chantels, Larry Williams, Screaming Jay Hawkins, The Pastels, Jo-Ann Campbell and Ed Townsend. On most days the acts played two shows.

1964 - The Beatles

Madame Tussauds, London unveiled the wax works images of The Beatles, the first pop stars to be honoured.

1967 - The Beatles

Working on sessions for the new Beatles album Sgt. Pepper at Abbey Road studios in London, John Lennon recorded his lead vocal for ‘Good Morning Good Morning’, and Paul McCartneyadded a lead guitar solo to the track. Lennon had decided he wanted to end the song with animal sound effects, and asked that they be sequenced in such a way that each successive animal was capable of scaring or eating the preceding one.

1968 - Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd recorded a performance for the BBC 2 TV Omnibus - The Sound of Change show from Barnes Common, London, England. The special, which was produced by Tony Palmer, also featured performances by The Who, Cream and The Jimi Hendrix Experience. The show was later broadcast in September of this year.

1970 - Simon and Garfunkel

Simon and Garfunkel were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with 'Bridge Over Troubled Water', the duo's only UK No.1. Only Art Garfunkel sang on the track.

1973 - Led Zeppelin

Led Zeppelin released their fifth studio album, Houses Of The Holy in the UK. The album title was a dedication by the band to their fans who appeared at venues they dubbed 'Houses of the Holy'. The cover is a collage of several photographs which were taken at the Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland, by Aubrey Powell of Hipgnosis. The two children who modelled for the cover were siblings Stefan and Samantha Gates.

1974 - Arthur Crudup

Delta blues singer and guitarist Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup died of a stroke at the age of 69. He wrote 'That's All Right (Mama)' covered by Elvis Presley and 'My Baby Left Me'.

1976 - Phil Collins

Genesis began their first North American tour since Peter Gabriel left the band, appearing in Buffalo, New York, with Phil Collinstaking over as lead singer.

1981 - Blondie

Blondie started a two week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Rapture', the group's fourth US No.1 and the first No. 1 song in the US to feature rap and its lyrics, notable for name-checking hip-hop pioneers Fab Five Freddy and Grandmaster Flash.

1982 - David Crosby

David Crosby was arrested after crashing his car on the San Diego Highway. Police also found cocaine and a pistol in the Crosby Stills & Nash stars car. When the police asked Crosby why he carried the gun, his reply was, 'John Lennon'. 

1992 - Ozzy Osbourne

Over a $100,000 (£58,800) worth of damage was caused at The Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre, California, when Ozzy Osbourneinvited the first two rows of the audience on stage. Several others took up the offer and the band was forced to exit the stage.

1995 - Jimmy McShane

Singer Jimmy McShane died of Aids. He had the 1985 UK No.3 single and European hit 'Tarzan Boy with Italian dance outfit Baltimora.

2000 - Jimmy Page

Jimmy Page accepted substantial undisclosed libel damages from a magazine which claimed he had caused or contributed to the death of his Led Zeppelin bandmate John Bonham. Page's solicitor, Norman Chapman, told High Court Judge Mr Justice Morland that the feature in Ministry magazine printed in 1999 claimed Page was more concerned with keeping vomit off his bed than saving his friend's life, and that he stood over him wearing Satanist robes and performing a useless spell.

2001 - Puff Daddy

The artist formerly known as both Puffy and Puff Daddy said in an interview on MTV he now wanted to be known as P. Diddy. In August 2005, he changed his stage name to simply 'Diddy.'

2005 - U2

After playing a warm-up date the night before at the Los Angeles Sports Arena, U2 kicked off their Vertigo tour at the iPay One Center in San Diego, California. The 131 date world tour would see the band playing in North America, Europe, South America and Japan. By the time it finished, the Vertigo Tour had sold 4,619,021 tickets, grossing $389 million; the second-highest figure ever for a world tour.

2006 - Whitney Houston

Tina Brown the sister-in-law of Whitney Houston sold pictures taken in her bathroom to the National Enquirer claiming Whitney Houston had been taking crack cocaine. The pictures showed drug paraphernalia including a crack-smoking pipe, rolling papers, cocaine-caked spoons and cigarette ends strewn across the surface tops of the bathroom.

2013 - Justin Bieber

Justin Bieber ran into some trouble at Munich airport when customs officials detained and quarantined his monkey.Bieber had recently been given the capuchin monkey as a pet by record producer Mally Mall. Bieber apparently brought the monkey along to join him on the Austrian and German leg of his European tour, but he didn't have the documentation required to bring his new friend into Germany. Bieber went on to perform in Munich while the monkey was kept in the custody of authorities.

2013 - Hugh McCracken

American rock guitarist and session musician Hugh McCracken died of leukemia in New York City at the age of 70. He appeared on many recordings by Steely Dan, Donald Fagen, Billy Joel, Roland Kirk, Roberta Flack, B. B. King, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, The Monkees, Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel, James Taylor, Phoebe Snow, Bob Dylan, Carly Simon, Graham Parker, Eric Carmen, Loudon Wainwright III, Aretha Franklin, Van Morrison, The Four Seasons, Hall and Oates, Gary Wright and Andy Gibb. Because of such high demand for his work, McCracken declined Paul McCartney's invitation to help form his new band, Wings after appearing on his 1971 album Ram.

2014 - Kate Bush

Tickets for Kate Bush first live shows in 35 years sold out in less than 15 minutes. The Before the Dawn concerts, which were booked to take place this August and September, marked the singer's first return to the stage since The Tour Of Life in 1979. Demand was so high that the singer's own website, as well as some ticket-selling sites, crashed as people tried to log on.

2018 - George Ezra

George Ezra was at No.1 on the UK album chart with his second studio album Staying at Tamara’s. It became the UK's best selling artist album of the year in 2018 and was nominated for British Album of the Year at the 2019 Brit Awards.

2021 - Malcolm Cecil

British jazz bassist, record producer Malcolm Cecil died age 84. He was a founding member of a leading UK jazz quintet of the late 1950s, the Jazz Couriers and later joined Cyril Davies and Alexis Korner to form the original line-up of Blues Incorporated. Cecil subsequently collaborated with Robert Margouleff to form the duo Tonto's Expanding Head Band, which led to them collaborating on and co-producing several of Stevie Wonder's Grammy-winning albums of the early 1970s. 

Born Today In Music

March 28th

1941 - Charlie McCoy

Charlie McCoy, Grammy-winning American session musician noted mainly for his harmonica performance, but also for his skill on a wide variety of instruments. He was a member of Area Code 615 and played the harmonica on the 1970 theme for UK BBC TV Music show 'The Old Grey Whistle Test', 'Stone Fox Chase.' McCoy has performed with musicians including Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Chet Atkins, Waylon Jennings and Loretta Lynn.

1945 - Chuck Portz

Chuck Portz, from the American rock The Turtles who had the US 1967 No.1 single 'Happy Together' and the 1967 hit 'She'd Rather Be with Me'.

1948 - John Evan

John Evan, British musician and composer. He is best known for having played keyboards for Jethro Tull from April 1970 to June 1980.

1948 - Milan Williams

Milan Williams, keyboards, brass, guitar from American funk/soul band, The Commodores, who had the 1978 UK & US No.1 single 'Three Times A Lady' as well as the hits 'Easy' and 'Nightshift'.

1949 - Sally Carr

Sally Carr, singer from Scottish pop group Middle Of The Road, who had the 1971 UK No.1 single 'Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep', which is one of only a few singles to have sold in excess of 10 million physical copies.

1954 - Reba McEntire

Reba McEntire country music artist and actress who has scored 35 No.1 singles and released over 25 albums. Sometimes referred to as 'The Queen of Country', she has sold more than 70 million albums worldwide as well as starring in her television sitcom, Reba for which she was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance in a Television Series–Musical or Comedy.

1962 - Ged Grimes

Ged Grimes, bassist from Scottish pop group Danny Wilson who had the 1988 UK No.3 single 'Mary's Prayer'. Grimes also works with Simple Minds.

1965 - Steve Turner

Steve Turner, guitarist with American alternative rock band Mudhoney. Their early releases on the Sub Pop label were massively influential on the Seattle music scene.

1969 - Cheryl James

Cheryl James (Salt) from American hip-hop/rap trio from New York City Salt-N-Pepa who had the 1991 hit single 'Let's Talk About Sex'.

1969 - James Atkin

James Atkin, guitar and vocals with British dance music/rock band EMF who had the 1990 UK No.3 & US No.1 single 'Unbelievable'. Their debut album, Schubert Dip, went to No.3 on the UK albums chart.

1976 - Dave Keuning

American guitarist Dave Keuning from The Killers, who scored the 2005 UK No.1 with their debut album Hot Fuss. Their 2017 album Wonderful Wonderful peaked at No.1 on the US & UK chart.

1986 - Lady Gaga

Lady Gaga, (Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta) American singer, songwriter. 2008 single US & UK No.1 single 'Just Dance', 2008 single 'Poker Face', reached No.1 in twenty countries. In 2012, Gaga was ranked at No.4 on Billboard's list of top moneymakers of 2011, grossing more than 25 million dollars.