Today in Tunes
On this day in music

January 11

11 moments from 1902 to 1999: 5 things that happened, 5 birthdays and 1 farewells.

Tune of the day
Please Please Me
The Beatles
Why today: 1963 · The Beatles release "Please Please Me" in the UK
Play on SpotifyApple Music

What happened on January 11

  1. 194086 yrs ago
    HappenedClassical

    Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet opens at the Kirov

    Galina Ulanova danced Juliet in the Leningrad production, which won wide acclaim even though choreographer Leonid Lavrovsky altered the score over Prokofiev's objections.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Romeo and Juliet (Prokofiev) - Wikipedia
  2. 196363 yrs ago
    HappenedRock

    The Beatles release "Please Please Me" in the UK

    Lennon first pictured it as a slow, Roy Orbison-style song before George Martin asked the band to speed it up. It reached No. 1 on the NME and Melody Maker charts.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Please Please Me (song) - Wikipedia
  3. 197155 yrs ago
    HappenedRock

    Janis Joplin's Pearl is released

    Issued three months after her death, it spent nine weeks at No. 1 and included "Me and Bobby McGee." One track stayed instrumental because she never recorded its vocal.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Pearl (Janis Joplin album) - Wikipedia
  4. 198442 yrs ago
    HappenedPop

    A Radio 1 DJ takes aim at "Relax" on air

    Mike Read's on-air objection was followed days later by a BBC ban on Frankie Goes to Hollywood's debut. The single still climbed to No. 1 and stayed there five weeks.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Relax (song) - Wikipedia
  5. 199234 yrs ago
    HappenedRock

    Nirvana's Nevermind hits No. 1 on the album chart

    Less than four months after its September 1991 release, the album knocked Michael Jackson's Dangerous from the top of the Billboard 200.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Nevermind - Wikipedia
  6. 1902124 yrs ago
    BornClassical

    Composer Maurice Duruflé is born in France

    A fiercely self-critical organist, he published only a handful of works. His Requiem, finished in 1947, remains his best-known piece.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Maurice Duruflé - Wikipedia
  7. 194284 yrs ago
    BornRock

    Clarence Clemons is born in Virginia

    Known as the Big Man, he played sax in Bruce Springsteen's E Street Band from 1972 until his death, including the soaring solo on "Jungleland."

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Clarence Clemons - Wikipedia
  8. 194680 yrs ago
    BornCountry

    Naomi Judd is born in Ashland, Kentucky

    With her daughter Wynonna she formed the Judds in 1980. The duo won five Grammys and racked up twenty top-ten country hits.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Naomi Judd - Wikipedia
  9. 195670 yrs ago
    BornHip-hop

    Big Bank Hank is born in the Bronx

    Henry Jackson was managing a rap crew and working at a pizzeria when he joined the Sugarhill Gang, whose "Rapper's Delight" carried hip hop onto the pop charts.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Big Bank Hank - Wikipedia
  10. 197155 yrs ago
    BornR&B / Soul

    Mary J. Blige is born in the Bronx

    Crowned the Queen of Hip-Hop Soul after her 1992 debut What's the 411?, she has won nine Grammys and topped the Hot 100 with "Family Affair."

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Mary J. Blige - Wikipedia
  11. 199927 yrs ago
    DiedFolk

    Italian songwriter Fabrizio De André dies

    The Genoa-born singer-songwriter, whose "La canzone di Marinella" became a hit after Mina sang it on TV, died in Milan at 58.

    Play on Spotify Apple Music Source: Fabrizio De André - Wikipedia