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Today in Music

May, 31

  • 2000 Latin jazz legend Tito Puente dies on the operating table of a New York hospital as a result of complications following 12 hours of open-heart surgery. He is 77.
  • 1999 “Behind the Music,” VH1’s highest-rated original series, begins airing at 9 p.m. nightly. The broadcasts kick off with the premiere of “The Red Hot Chili Peppers: Behind the Music.”
  • 1998 Geri “Ginger Spice” Halliwell confirms her departure from the Virgin Girl Power group The Spice Girls, citing the split to differences between herself and her band mates. A statement read to the press by her lawyer ends with the phrase “P.S. I’ll be back.”
  • 1997 A very nervous Lee Ann Womack makes her Grand Ole Opry debut. The singer is so nervous that she barely moves from center stage during her performance. Of the jittery big night, Womack later said “If I’d moved, I would’ve peed in my pants.”
  • 1996 Singer Elsbeary Hobbs dies at the age of 60.
  • 1995 Bob Dole blasts Hollywood, singling out Time Warner for “the marketing of evil” in movies and music. He later admits he hasn’t seen or heard much of what he’s criticized.
  • 1993 Rocker Jon Bon Jovi and wife Dorothea Hurley have their first child in Red Bank, N.J. They name their daughter Stephanie Rose.
  • 1987 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “You Keep Me Hangin’ On,” Kim Wilde.
  • 1972 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “I’ll Take You There,” The Staple Singers.
  • 1964 Dave Clark Five makes the first of 12 appearance on TV’s “Ed Sullivan Show.”
  • 1957 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “Love Letters in the Sand,” Pat Boone.
  • 1944 Guitarist Mick Ralphs is born in Heresford, England. He is a founding member of Mott the Hoople, but leaves the group in 1973 to form Bad Company. Bad Company has two top 10 singles: “Can’t Get Enough” and “Feel Like Makin’ Love.”
  • 1930 Actor, director Clint Eastwood is born in San Francisco, Calif. Eastwood is self-taught jazz musician and pianist. He plays three songs in the movie “In The Line of Fire,” and composed two Cajun-inspired instrumentals for the movie “A Perfect World.”
  • 1919 Musician Emmanual Tettey Mensah is born.