Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives was an acclaimed American folk music singer, author and actor.
Possibly his most remembered role today is as narrator Sam the Snowman in the Rankin-Bass animated television special, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1964).
Ives’s “A Holly Jolly Christmas” is a very popular tune during the Christmas season, as it’s frequently played on the radio and was featured in the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer special.
Burl Icle Ivanhoe Ives (14 June 1909 – 14 April 1995)
Posted in Because I Can, Music, The Little Screen (Television)
Don Ho, born Donald Tai Loy Ho (August 13, 1930 – April 14, 2007) was a Hawaiian musician and entertainer. He was best known for his song, “Tiny Bubbles.”
Posted in Because I Can, Music
Ignore the girls (if you want) – but check out these cars!!! (Oh, and the music!)
https://youtu.be/T95NMc9qHto
Posted in Music, Planes Trains and Automobiles
Jeff Healey (March 25, 1966 – March 2, 2008)
Norman Jeffrey Healey, known professionally as Jeff Healey, was a blind Canadian jazz and blues-rock guitarist and vocalist. Healey was most widely known for his appearance as the blind guitar player in Roadhouse, and for his distinctive way of playing his guitar laid flat across his lap.
Healey was blind; he lost his sight when he was one year old, due to retinoblastoma, a rare cancer of the eyes which he suffered from throughout his life and which ultimately killed him.
Posted in Because I Can, Music
Johnny Cash (February 26, 1932 – September 12, 2003)
Johnny Cash, born J. R. Cash, was a Grammy Award-winning American country singer-songwriter. Cash is widely considered to be one of the most influential American musicians of the 20th century.
Cash was known for his deep, distinctive voice, the boom-chick-a-boom or “freight train” sound of his Tennessee Three backing band, his demeanor, and his dark clothing, which earned him the nickname “The Man in Black”. He traditionally started his concerts with the simple introduction “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.”
He sold over 90 million albums in his nearly fifty-year career and came to occupy a “commanding position in music history”.
Posted in Because I Can, Music
Ray Stevens (born Harold Ray Ragsdale) is an American country music and pop singer-songwriter known for his novelty songs. His two most-popular songs are “Everything Is Beautiful” and “The Streak”.
Harold Ray Ragsdale (January 24, 1939 – )
Posted in Because I Can, Humor, Music
Little Jimmy Dickens (December 19, 1920 – January 2, 2015)
James Cecil Dickens, better known as Little Jimmy Dickens, was an American country music singer famous for his humorous novelty songs, his small size, 4’11” (150 cm), and his rhinestone-studded outfits (which he is given credit for introducing into country music live performances). He started as a member of the Grand Ole Opry in 1948 and became a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1983. At the time of his death, he was the oldest living member of the Grand Ole Opry.
Dickens was hospitalized after a stroke on December 25, 2014, days after his last appearance on the Opry to mark his birthday. He died of cardiac arrest on January 2, 2015, at the age of 94.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfYFx6MOTYU
Roger Dean Miller (January 2, 1936 – October 25, 1992)
Roger Miller was an American singer, songwriter, and musician.
Wikipedia Link
Posted in Because I Can, Music
John Robert “Joe” Cocker, OBE (May 20, 1944 – December 22, 2014) was an English rock and blues singer and musician who came to popularity in the 1960s. He was known for his gritty voice, spasmodic body movement in performance, and cover versions of popular songs, particularly those of The Beatles.
Cocker’s cover of The Beatles’ “With a Little Help from My Friends” reached number one in the UK in 1968. He performed the song live at Woodstock in 1969, and at the Party at the Palace concert for the Golden Jubilee of Elizabeth II in 2002. His version also became the theme song for the TV series The Wonder Years. His 1974 cover of “You Are So Beautiful“, reached number five in the US. Cocker was the recipient of several awards, including a 1983 Grammy Award for his US number one “Up Where We Belong”, a duet with Jennifer Warnes.
Joe Cocker died of lung cancer on December 22, 2014.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bbMyksobL-U
Richard Wagstaff “Dick” Clark (November 30, 1929 – April 18, 2012)
Richard Wagstaff “Dick” Clark is an American television personality and businessman, best known for hosting long-running shows such as American Bandstand, various Pyramid game shows, and Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve.
Clark has long been known for his continued youthful appearance, earning the moniker “America’s Oldest Teenager”, and also for his good health — until he suffered a stroke in 2004. With some speech ability still impaired, Clark made a dramatic return to his New Year’s show on December 31, 2005, and appeared at the Emmy Awards on August 27, 2006.
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Charles Edward Daniels is an American country music, Southern rock, and jazz singer, fiddler, and guitarist.
Charles Daniels (October 28, 1936 – )
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Roger Miller (January 2, 1936 – October 25, 1992)
Roger Dean Miller was an American singer, songwriter, musician and actor, best known for his honky-tonk-influenced novelty songs. His most recognized tunes included the chart-topping country music and pop music hits King of the Road, Dang Me, and England Swings, all of which came from the Nashville sound era of the mid-1960s.
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Stephen (“Stevie”) Ray Vaughan, born in Dallas, Texas, was an American blues guitarist, known as one of the most influential electric blues musicians in history. He is often referred to by his initials, SRV.
Stevie Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954 – August 27, 1990)
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Minecraft Abbey Road
Beatles Abbey Road
Abbey Road is the eleventh studio album by the English rock band the Beatles, released on September 26, 1969 in the United Kingdom and on October 1, 1969 in the United States. The recording sessions for the album were the last in which all four Beatles participated. Although Let It Be was the final album that the Beatles completed before the band’s dissolution in April 1970, most of that album had been recorded before the Abbey Road sessions began.
Posted in Because I Can, Music
James Joseph “Jim” Croce (January 10, 1943 – September 20, 1973)
James Joseph “Jim” Croce (“crow-chee”) was an American singer-songwriter. Between 1966 and 1973, Croce released six studio albums and 11 singles. His singles “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown” and “Time in a Bottle” were both number one hits on the Billboard Hot 100 charts.
Croce, 30, Maury Muehleisen, 24, and four others died in a small commercial plane crash on September 20, 1973 after leaving a concert.
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Johnny Cash (February 26, 1932 – September 12, 2003)
Johnny Cash, born J. R. Cash, was a Grammy Award-winning American country singer-songwriter. Cash is widely considered to be one of the most influential American musicians of the 20th century.
Cash was known for his deep, distinctive voice, the boom-chick-a-boom or “freight train” sound of his Tennessee Three backing band, his demeanor, and his dark clothing, which earned him the nickname “The Man in Black”. He traditionally started his concerts with the simple introduction “Hello, I’m Johnny Cash.”
He sold over 90 million albums in his nearly fifty-year career and came to occupy a “commanding position in music history”.
Posted in Because I Can, Music
Van Morrison, (born August 31, 1945) is a Northern Irish singer-songwriter and musician. His live performances at their best are regarded as transcendental and inspired; while some of his recordings, such as the studio albums Astral Weeks and Moondance, and the live album It’s Too Late to Stop Now, are widely viewed as among the greatest ever made.
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Stephen (“Stevie”) Ray Vaughan (October 3, 1954 – August 27, 1990), born in Dallas, Texas, was an American blues guitarist, known as one of the most influential electric blues musicians in history. He is often referred to by his initials, SRV.
Accidental death
Vaughan’s comeback was cut short when, in the early morning of August 27, 1990, he died in a helicopter crash near East Troy, Wisconsin. After a concert at the Alpine Valley Music Theater, where earlier in the evening he appeared with Robert Cray, Buddy Guy, Eric Clapton and his older brother Jimmie Vaughan, the musicians expected a long bus ride back to Chicago. Stevie was informed that three seats were open on one of the helicopters returning to Chicago with Clapton and his crew, enough for Stevie, Jimmie, and Jimmie’s wife Connie. It turned out there was only one seat left, which Stevie requested from his brother; Jimmie obliged. Taking off into deep fog, the helicopter crashed moments later into a ski slope on the side of a hill within the Alpine Valley Resort. Vaughan, the pilot, and members of Clapton’s crew (his agent, assistant tour manager, and a bodyguard) died on impact. No one realized that the crash had occurred until the helicopter failed to arrive in Chicago, and the wreckage was only found with the help of its locator beacon.
Stevie Ray Vaughan is interred in the Laurel Land Memorial Park, Dallas, Texas.
Posted in Because I Can, Music, On This Day
Wikipedia Link