Today is the birthday
… of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Mike Stoller. He’s 77.
Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller have written some of the most spirited and enduring rock and roll songs: “Hound Dog” (originally cut by Big Mama Thornton in 1953 and covered by Elvis Presley three years later), “Love Potion No. 9” (the Clovers), “Kansas City” (Wilbert Harrison), “On Broadway” (the Drifters), “Ruby Baby” (Dion) and “Stand By Me” (Ben E. King). Their vast catalog includes virtually every major hit by the Coasters (e.g., “Searchin’,” “Young Blood,” “Charlie Brown,” “Yakety Yak” and “Poison Ivy”). They also worked their magic on Elvis Presley, writing “Jailhouse Rock,” “Treat Me Nice” and “You’re So Square (Baby I Don’t Care)” specifically for him. All totaled, Presley recorded more than 20 Leiber and Stoller songs.
Leiber wrote the lyrics. Stoller wrote the music.
… of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Neil Sedaka. He’s 71.
Singer, songwriter, and pianist Neil Sedaka enjoyed two distinct periods of commercial success in two slightly different styles of pop music: first, as a teen pop star in the late ’50s and early ’60s, then as a singer of more mature pop/rock in the 1970s. In both phases, Sedaka, a classically trained pianist, composed the music for his hits, which he sang in a boyish tenor. And throughout, even when his performing career was at a low ebb, he served as a songwriter for other artists, resulting in a string of hits year in and year out, whether recorded by him or someone else. For himself, he wrote eight U.S. Top Ten pop hits, including the chart-toppers “Breaking Up Is Hard to Do,” “Laughter in the Rain,” and “Bad Blood.” The most successful cover of one of his compositions was Captain & Tennille’s recording of “Love Will Keep Us Together,” another number one.
… of William H. Macy. He’s 60. Macy was nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar for his performance in Fargo.
Percival Lowell was born March 13th in 1855. Lowell is credited with the discovery of Pluto, but Pluto isn’t even mentioned in his obituary. The foremost “discovery” of Professor Lowell’s career concerned Mars. The following is an excerpt from his obituary in 1916:
The great controversy among astronomers, in which he played a leading part, began in 1907 after his announcement that the observations made by his astronomical station, the Lowell Observatory at Flagstaff, Ariz., proved that Mars was inhabited. Professor Lowell had put the theory forward tentatively as early as 1895. Many eminent astronomers in this country and Europe accepted his conclusions of 1907 as unassailable. Others were skeptical. Professor Lowell continued from year to year to produce fresh evidence in favor of his theory by his observations at Flagstaff, where is located the best astronomical plant in the world for the observation of Mars.
Professor Lowell’s theory begins with the demonstration that the primary requisites for human life exist on the planet–water, heat, and atmosphere. His positive proof of the existence of human life on Mars is the network of lines which mark certain areas of the planet’s face, indicating the digging of artificial canals, which would require an intelligence and engineering skill as great or greater than that possessed by the inhabitants of this earth.
I can’t believe Liza Minelli is only 64 and Neil Sedaka is only 71. Each one seems at least a decade older. Must be all the plastic surgery.
Liza comes by it naturally. Judy Garland, Liza’s mother, died just after she turned 47. But, if you look at photos of her from the years before her death, she looks at least 20 or 25 years older than that.
Yeah, but I question whether that’s genetics or really hard living, with mass quantities of booze/drugs. As regards both women.
Agreed Elise, but some geneticists would argue that the ingestion of mass quantities of booze/drugs is often as genetically determined as aging and looks.
Very good–and sad–point.