December, 19 – ::] Welcome to Kesimedia [::

2000 Pops Staples, (born Roebuck Staples) patriarch of R&B group the Staple Singers, dies at the age of 84. He had suffered a concussion recently in a fall near his home in Dalton, Ill.

2000 Jazz bassist and photographer Milt Hinton dies in Queens, N.Y., after a long hospitalization. He is 90.

2000 Robert Buck, guitarist and songwriter for 10,000 Maniacs, dies in Pittsburgh of complications from liver failure. He is 42.

2000 Martina McBride’s acoustic performance of “O Holy Night” from a Nov. 21 radio appearance generates some help for a needy Nashville family when 25 custom-made CD copies are auctioned. The money raised is used to aid the Matthews family, whose father, a truck driver, had his arm crushed in a work-related accident.

1999 Goo Goo Dolls narrowly avoid serious injury when the military plane they are aboard skids off the runway at a U.S. Naval Air Station in Sicily, Italy. The group is on its way back from Bosnia, where they had just performed for soldiers at Tuzla army base. The plane attempts two landing approaches before touching down on the third attempt. The plane skids off the runway and then slides back on again, damaging the craft’s landing gear and wing. Passengers exit via emergency chutes onto the runway.

1997 The founder of Sony Corp., Masaru Ibuka dies at the age of 89 from heart failure. Ibuka, one of the leading engineer-entrepreneurs of post-World War II Japan, helped transform modern culture with the world’s first pocket transistor radio.

1997 Jimmy Rogers, blues guitarist for the original Muddy Waters band, and soloist with such hits as “Walking By Myself,” dies from colon cancer at the age of 73.

1997 Singer and founding member Marty Raybon makes his last appearance with country group Shenandoah at the Wildhorse Saloon in Nashville, Tenn.

1979 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “Escape (Pina Colada Song),” Rupert Holmes. The song tops the pop singles chart for two weeks and is the last No. 1 song of the 1970s.

1958 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “The Chipmunk Song,” The Chipmunks with David Seville. The song is the second No. 1 for Chipmunks creator Ross Bagdasarian, alias David Seville. Before he created the Chipmunks, Seville hit in April 1958 with “Witch Doctor.”