Music History for October 9

Today's:

1813 - Composer Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi was born.

1835 - Composer Charles-Camille Saint-Saens was born.

1959 - Bobby Darin became the youngest performer to headline the Sands Hotel's Copa Room in Las Vegas, NV. Johnny Mathis held the previous record (he had been 23).

1964 - The Rolling Stones announced they had cancelled a planned tour in South Africa because of an anti-apartheid embargo by the British Musicians' Union.

1967 - Doc Severinsen replaced Skitch Henderson as musical director of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson

1974 - Quincy Jones accepted his first gold record. It was for the album Body Heat.

1985 - A 2½-acre garden memorial was dedicated to John Lennon by his widow Yoko Ono. The memorial in New York City’s Central Park is called Strawberry Fields.

2003 - Britain's Queen Elizabeth II made Sting a CBE (Commander of the British Empire).