Chapter 01 — Today in music
On a day like today December 8
1980
John Lennon is murdered outside his New York home
John Lennon is shot dead by a disturbed fan at the entrance of the Dakota building, hours after signing an autograph for him. He was 40 and had just returned to music with “Double Fantasy”. The world mourned in massive vigils: not just a Beatle had died, but the illusion that his generation still had a spokesman.
John Lennon
1925
Sammy Davis Jr. is born, who filled rooms where he was not allowed to sleep
On December 8, 1925, Sammy Davis Jr. was born in Harlem. He stepped on a stage for the first time at three and never got off. He sang, danced, acted and did impressions, and for years he headlined shows at Las Vegas hotels that would not let him stay the night because he was Black. He lost an eye in a car crash in 1954 and was back at work two months later.
Sammy Davis Jr.
Frank Sinatra
1925
Jimmy Smith is born, who took the Hammond organ out of church and made it improvise
On December 8, 1925, Jimmy Smith was born in Norristown, Pennsylvania. He shut himself in a warehouse for a full year studying the Hammond B-3 before letting anyone hear him. When he came out he had invented a language: bass on the pedals, chords with the left hand, saxophonist lines with the right. Every organ trio, and much of soul jazz, comes out of that.
Jimmy Smith
1939
Jerry Butler is born, who left soul for politics and won at both
On December 8, 1939, Jerry Butler was born in Mississippi, nicknamed the Iceman for his calm on stage. He was the first lead voice of the Impressions alongside his friend Curtis Mayfield, went solo, and cut records with Gamble and Huff that anticipated the Philadelphia sound. In 1985 he was elected to the Cook County government and stayed there for more than three decades.
Jerry Butler
Curtis Mayfield
The Impressions
1943
Jim Morrison is born, the Lizard King who wanted to be a poet
Jim Morrison is born in Melbourne, Florida: an admiral's son who reinvented himself as rock's shaman with The Doors. Between “Light My Fire” and “The End”, he mixed Rimbaud with the blues and turned every concert into an unpredictable ritual. He died in Paris at 27, leaving the eternal question of whether he was a genius, an inflated myth, or both.
Jim Morrison
The Doors
1947
Gregg Allman is born, the voice of the South who outlived all his bandmates
On December 8, 1947, Gregg Allman was born in Nashville, organist and singer of the Allman Brothers Band. He lost his brother Duane in a motorcycle crash in 1971 and bassist Berry Oakley a year later, almost in the same spot. He went on singing "Whipping Post" for another forty-five years, with a voice that sounded older than he was from the age of twenty.
Gregg Allman
The Allman Brothers Band
1966
Sinéad O'Connor is born, who was right twenty years before everyone else
On December 8, 1966, Sinéad O'Connor was born in Dublin. With "Nothing Compares 2 U" she went to number one across half the world in 1990. Two years later she tore up a photograph of the Pope live on American television to denounce the abuse of children inside the Catholic Church. The industry punished her and erased her; a decade later official reports proved her right.
Sinéad O'Connor
Prince
1982
Nicki Minaj is born, who came from Trinidad and rewrote where women stand in rap
On December 8, 1982, Onika Maraj was born in Saint James, Trinidad and Tobago, and moved to Queens at five. As Nicki Minaj she used dozens of voices and characters inside a single song and became the first woman with seven simultaneous entries on the Hot 100. Her guest verse on Kanye West's "Monster" is still the example people cite to explain what she was capable of.
Nicki Minaj
1865
Jean Sibelius is born, whose music had to premiere under false titles to dodge censorship
On December 8, 1865, Jean Sibelius was born in Hämeenlinna. He composed "Finlandia" in 1899 as a protest against Russian imperial censorship. The piece became so plainly patriotic that it had to be programmed under invented names in order to be played at all. Sibelius lived to ninety-one but spent his last thirty years without publishing a single new work.
Jean Sibelius
1974
Cristian Castro is born, the soap-opera son who made his own place by singing
On December 8, 1974, Cristian Castro was born in Mexico City, son of Verónica Castro, the most popular actress on Mexican television at the time. He started acting as a child and switched to music at seventeen, where he had to prove for years that he was not living off the family name. He ended up with more than twenty albums and a tenor voice that survived every passing fashion.
Cristian Castro
Verónica Castro
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