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Today in Music

January, 6

  • 1999 French Jazz piano virtuoso Michel Petrucciani dies in New York following a brief respiratory illness. He is 36. Petrucciani was the first French artist signed to EMI’s Blue Note imprint, for which he released several albums from 1986-1994.
  • 1996 Renowned fiddle player Robert Russell “Chubby” Wise dies of heart failure following pneumonia in Bowie, Md. Age 80. Wise performed and recorded with Bill Monroe & the Blue Grass Boys during the group’s classic period in the ‘40s. He also worked briefly with Hank Williams and was a member of Hank Snow’s band, the Rainbow Ranch Boys, for 16 years.
  • 1993 Bass guitarist Bill Wyman announces that he has officially left the Rolling Stones. The group last toured together in 1990.
  • 1993 Trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie dies in an Englewood, N.J., hospital after a yearlong battle with pancreatic cancer. He was 75. The jazz legend received a Lifetime Achievement Award in 1989 from the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences.
  • 1977 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “You Don’t Have to Be a Star (to Be in My Show),” Marilyn McCoo & Billy Davis Jr.
  • 1958 No. 1 Billboard Pop Hit: “At the Hop,” Danny & the Juniors. The four members of the group all grew up in Philadelphia and started singing together in high school as the Juvenairs.
  • 1946 Syd Barrett (Roger Barrett) of Pink Floyd is born. He names the group after bluesmen Pink Anderson and Floyd Council. Billboard ranks the group’s 1973 album “Dark Side of the Moon” as the longest-charting album of all time. It stays on the magazine’s pop album chart for more than 10 years and sells more than 10 million copies.