Jimi managed to get through a total of only seven dates with the Monkees, culminating in his final show on July 17, 1967, which may or may not have ended with Hendrix saluting the crowd with his middle finger.
Aaron Burr expresses his envy of Alexander Hamilton's influence in the newly-formed government and wishes he had similar power. He decides to rectify this by running for political office in an effort to be in the metaphorical "room where it happens".
Unlike most opera composers, Wagner wrote both the libretto and the music for each of his stage works. Initially establishing his reputation as a composer of works in the romantic vein of Carl Maria von Weber and Giacomo Meyerbeer, Wagner revolutionized opera through his concept of the Gesamtkunstwerk ("total work of art"), by which he sought to synthesize the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, with music subsidiary to drama.
"Great Gig in the Sky" is one of the few Pink Floyd songs to use a female vocal. The band wanted a girl who could sing like she was having an orgasm. Their engineer, Alan Parsons, brought in a singer he knew named Clare Torry who provided the hauntingly beautiful improvised vocal on the song. Thirty years later, she would sue Pink Floyd over rights to the song.
U2's "Angel of Harlem" was written about Billie Holiday, a Jazz singer who moved to Harlem as a teenager in 1928. She had a difficult childhood which affected her life and career, but she went on to play a variety of nightclubs and became famous for her spectacular voice and ability to move her audience to tears. Her final years, however, were tragic. She became addicted to heroine, was swindled out of her earnings, and died of cirrhosis of the liver at age 44 with only $0.70 in the bank. She was arrested on her deathbed, in 1959, as narcotic addiction at that time was considered a crime, not an illness.
Bessie Smith, the greatest of all blues singers, is known as the "Empress of the Blues". A protégé of an earlier blues singer named Ma Rainey, Bessie recorded during the 1920s. Her flair and dramatic style would set the stage for many artists to come, including other transitional favorites from the 1950's, such as Etta James and Dinah Washington. Bessie Smith died at the young age of forty-three in a tragic automobile accident.
"Baby One More Time" was Britney Spears' first hit. The album sold over 13 million copies in the US and rocketed Britney to super-stardom.
"All I Wanna Do" is adapted from the poem "Fun" by Wyn Cooper. Sheryl Crow had written music for the song but was unhappy with her original lyrics. Her producer bought her ten random books of poetry, and Crow adapted "Fun" to accompany the music. Cooper is listed as a co-writer and receives royalties from the song.
While Linkin Park was at one time called "Hybrid Theory", they started out as "Xero". For legal reasons, they eventually dropped both of the original names and settled on "Linkin Park" (a deliberate misspelling of the Santa Monica, California landmark Lincoln Park).
The didgeridoo is a wind instrument developed by Indigenous Australians within the last 1,500 years and still in widespread use today. It is often used to accompany ceremonial dancing and singing.
SHARE THIS PAGE!