March 9th

Musical birthdays today include Lloyd 'Mr. Personality' Price (87), country singer Mickey Gilley (84), John Cale (78), former Paul Revere & the Raiders frontman Mark Lindsay (78), Robin Trower (75), former Family bassist Jim Cregan (74), Manfred Mann guitarist Chris Thompson (72), ABC lead singer Martin Fry (62), ex-Big Country & Runrig keyboardist Pete Wishart (58), Fugazi drummer Brendan Canty (54), Ben Folds Five bassist Robert Sledge (52), and Thirty Seconds to Mars drummer Shannon Leto (50). 

Shoutout to the Great Beyond for hymn composer Phoebe Knapp [best remembered for 'Blessed Assurance'], born on this day in 1839... for composer Samuel Barber, born in 1910... for  Ornette Coleman, who would have been 90 today... for  jazz & pop singer Keely Smith, who would have been 88... for former Hawkwind frontman Robert Calvert, who would have been 75... for swing singer & bandleader Bob Crosby, who died on this date in 1993... for Chris 'Biggie Smalls' Wallace, who was shot to death on this day in 1997 at the age of 24... and for former Boston lead singer Brad Delp, who took his own life today in 2007 at the age of 55.

Also on March 9th: Violin virtuoso Nicolo Paganini makes his Paris debut, with Liszt and Meyerbeer in the audience (1831)... Miles Davis convenes the third and last of the sessions that produce Birth of the Cool (1959)... The Beatles finish filming the train sequences in 'A Hard Day's Night'. Over the last six days, the Fab Four have travelled
 some 2,500 miles on Britain's rail network... Capitol Records release a song called 'Letter To The Beatles' by The Four Preps. The lyrics describe a boy lamenting the fact that he's lost his girlfriend to the Fabs. On its first day, the record shoots to № 85 on the charts and it looks like The Preps are going to have another hit on their hands. Unfortunately they included a few bars from 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' without permission, and Capitol are forced to withdraw the single to avoid a lawsuit (1964)... The Beach Boys begin recording 'God Only Knows' (1966)... Bob Dylan's John Wesley Harding goes to № 1 on the UK album chart, beginning a 10-week run at the top (1968)...  Having recently discarded the band name Earth, Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward make their concert debut as Black Sabbath at the Roundhouse, London (1970)... Asylum Records release the album Byrds, a reunion of the group's 5 original members organized by David Geffen's label (1973)... Telly Savalas of 'Kojak' fame has the № 1 single in Britain with his cover of the Bread hit 'If' (1975)... The Jacksons' CBS variety show airs for the last time (1977)... Robert Plant plays an unpublicised show at Keele University in the UK with his new band The Honeydrippers (1981)... Mick Jagger releases his solo single 'Just Another Night'... REO Speedwagon are at the top of the US charts with 'Can't Fight This Feeling' (1985)... U2 release The Joshua Tree (1987)... Oasis guitarist Noel Gallagher walks offstage during a concert at the Vernon Valley Gorge ski resort in New Jersey saying that his hands are too cold to play (1996)... Tom Jones announces that he has been banned from wearing skin-tight leather trousers on stage by his son and manager Mark. The younger Jones supposedly told his father that at 63, it was time for him to "start dressing his age" (2004)... Lil' Wayne is sentenced to a year on Rikers Island after pleading guilty to gun possession (2010).