History Highlight:

Today in 2000, The Cars' singer and bass player Benjamin Orr died of cancer at home in Atlanta at the age of 53. Orr had been the voice on a number of the band's biggest hits, including "Let's Go," "Drive," "Moving In Stereo" and "Just What I Needed."

Also, Today In:

1945 - Elvis Presley made his first ever-public appearance in a talent contest at the Mississippi Alabama Dairy Show singing 'Old Shep'. Elvis was 10 years old at the time and came in second.

1964 - The Animals' first self-titled album featuring "The House of The Rising Sun" entered the album charts.

1967 - American singer/songwriter Woody Guthrie died after suffering from Huntington's Chorea disease.

1968 - Working at Trident Studios in London, The Beatles recorded the new George Harrison song "Savoy Truffle".

1978 - The members of Aerosmith bailed thirty fans out of jail after they were arrested for smoking pot during an Aerosmith concert at Fort Wayne Coliseum.

1991 - M.C. Hammer offered a $50,000 reward for the return of Michael Jackson's white glove, which had been stolen from the Motown Museum.

1992 - Sinead O'Connor tore up a photograph of the Pope in front of an Saturday Night Live audience in protest of the Vatican's stance on abortion. It effectively ended O'Connor's career.

1999 - Akio Morita, the founder of Sony electronics, died aged 78. The 1979 Sony Walkman transformed both Sony and consumers across the world.

2002 - Original Iron Butterfly guitarist/vocalist Darryl DeLoach died of liver cancer at the age of 56.

2014 - A mint-condition copy of The Beatles' Please Please Me album, signed by George Harrison, Paul McCartney, John Lennon and Ringo Starr sold for $36,655 at an auction held in the US.

Birthdays:

Lindsey Buckingham is 67 today.

Chubby Checker is 75 today.

Ronnie Laws, saxophone player from Earth, Wind and Fire is 66.

Gwen Stefani is 47.

Backstreet Boy Kevin Richardson is 45.

Ashlee Simpson is 32.

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