This Day in Music

Billboard Staff
Updated ·2 min read
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2004 – Buddy Guy and Etta James are the big winners at the W.C. Handy Blues Awards, presented by the non-profit Blues Foundation at the Cannon Center Ballroom in Memphis. Singer/guitarist Guy was named contemporary blues male artist of the year, and his Silvertone album “Blues Singer” was selected blues album of the year and acoustic blues album of the year. Vocalist James was honored as soul blues female artist of the year; her Private Music release “Let’s Roll” scored as soul blues album of the year.

1999 – It is announced that drummer Tommy Lee has quit Motley Crue to devote time to his new band and family, following his reunion with Pamela Anderson Lee. Lee’s new band is called Methods of Mayhem.

1998 – Steven Tyler sustains a knee injury at Aerosmith’s concert in Anchorage, Alaska. The injury is bad enough to require surgery and force the band to postpone the 14 remaining dates of its North American tour.

1993 – One of rock’n’roll’s preeminent guitarists and producers, Mick Ronson, 46, dies of cancer of the liver in London. Ronson, aside from his solo credits, is probably best known for his guitar work with David Bowie and with Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue.

1992 – Singer Paula Abdul marries actor Emilio Estevez in Santa Monica, Calif. It is the first marriage for both 28-year-olds. They only have a short honeymoon, though, as Abdul resumes her concert tour in two days.

1992 – Country music singer Doug Stone undergoes quadruple-bypass surgery in Nashville, Tenn. Stone experienced chest pains three days earlier at a concert in Oregon.

1976 – Bruce Springsteen tries to climb over the fence at Elvis Presley’s Graceland estate in an attempt to see Presley. He is escorted off the premises by guards.

1984 – No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “Against All Odds (Take a Look at Me Now),” Phil Collins. The single is the title song of the film starring Jeff Bridges and Rachel Ward.

1972 – No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” Roberta Flack. The song is the first of Flack’s three No. 1 songs.

1968 – The musical “Hair” opens at the Biltmore Theater on Broadway.

1949 – Francis Rossi of Status Quo is born in London.

1947 – Tommy James (Thomas Jackson), leader of Tommy James and the Shondells, is born in Dayton, Ohio. The group has two No. 1 hits.

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