History Highlight:

Thurston Moore, influential guitarist and singer, is 59 today. Best known as a singer, songwriter and guitarist of Sonic Youth, he also runs the Ecstatic Peace! record label and was ranked 34th in Rolling Stone's 2004 edition of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time."

Also, Today In:

1925 - The first 50,000-watt radio station, WGY from Schenectady, NY, began transmission.

1965 - At the Newport Folk Festival, Bob Dylan played an electric set for the first time, horrifying folk purists everywhere.

1968 - The Beatles recorded their first take of George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps." Harrison had been reading the Chinese philosophical text the I Ching, which stipulates that there are no coincidences in the universe (i.e. that everything is connected and thus meant to be), and decided to use the book as inspiration to write a song. So, he opened another book and told himself he would compose a song based on the very first words his eyes landed on. The words turned out to be "gently weeps".

1969 - Neil Young appeared with Crosby, Stills and Nash for the first time at The Fillmore East in New York. Young was initially asked to help out with live material only, but ended up joining the group on and off for the next 30 years.

1989 - After leaving Def Jam, Beastie Boys released their second album, Paul's Boutique, on Capitol Records.

1999 - Woodstock '99 ended in chaos with riots, fires, looting, three rapes, and other crimes, including three accidental deaths. In addition, several fans were hospitalized from drinking polluted water.

2003 - Erik Braunn, Iron Butterfly guitarist, died of a heart attack related to a birth defect in Los Angeles, California, at age 52.

2009 - World War I veteran Harry Patch, the subject of the Radiohead song "Harry Patch (In Memory Of)," died at age 111.

Birthdays:

William 'Benny' Benjamin, primary drummer for Motown house band, The Funk Brothers, was born on this day in 1925.

Rock musician and composer Tom Dawes (lead vocalist of The Cyrkle) was born in Albany, New York in 1944. He is also remembered for writing the music for some of advertising's best-known commercial jingles, including "Plop, Plop, Fizz, Fizz" for Alka-Seltzer and "7Up, the Uncola".

Jim McCarty, Yardbirds drummer, is 73.

Highlights for Today in Music History are gathered from This Day in Music, Paul Shaffer's Day in Rock, Song Facts and Wikipedia.