History Highlight:

Today in 1964, The Beatles' first film, A Hard Day's Night, opened in 500 American theaters. Shot in cinema vérité style, the film portrays several days in the lives of the group. Following its U.K. and U.S. releases, A Hard Day's Night proved a financial and critical success. Time magazine rated it as one of the all-time great 100 films. British critic Leslie Halliwell described it as a "comic fantasia with music; an enormous commercial success with the director trying every cinematic gag in the book" and awarded it a full four stars; Roger Ebert described the film as "one of the great life-affirming landmarks of the movies", and added it to his list of The Great Movies. A Hard Day's Night includes 12 Beatles songs in its soundtrack and is credited as being one of the most influential musical films of all time, inspiring numerous spy films, The Monkees' television show and music videos.

Also, Today In:

1966 - The Beatles kicked off their last U.S. tour at the Chicago International Amphitheatre (a venue that was demolished in 1999).

1967 - Fleetwood Mac made their stage debut at the London National Jazz & Blues Festival.

1968 - Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, John Paul Jones and John Bonham practiced for the first time together beneath a record store at 22 Gerrard Street in London's West End.

1970 - !t Harvard University, Janis Joplin performed what would be her final concert. Her final performance was with the Full Tilt Boogie Band.The Harvard Crimson gave the performance a positive, front-page review, despite the fact that the band used makeshift amplifiers after their regular sound equipment was stolen in Boston. Joplin will go down in history as one of the biggest female rock stars of all time, not just because of her uninhibited musical talent but also because of her wild and turbulent lifestyle. She died of an overdose on Oct. 4 of that year at the young age of 27, after releasing three albums (a fourth which was released posthumously).

1970 - A Woody Guthrie memorial concert was held at the Hollywood Bowl. It featured performances by his son, Arlo, along with Bob Dylan and Joan Baez.

1977 - Guitarist Henri Padovani quit the band the Police after nine months, leaving them a trio.

1978 - The Commodores started a two-week run at No. 1 on the U.S. singles chart with "Three Times A Lady." Lionel Richie wrote the song about his love for his wife, mother and grandmother, hence "Once, twice, three times a lady …"

1984 - As The Olympic Games came to a close, Lionel Richie performed "All Night Long" live from Los Angeles to an estimated television audience of 2.6 billion people around the world.

1989 - The two-day Moscow Music Peace Festival was held at The Lenin Stadium in Moscow, Russia. Western acts that appeared included Mötley Crüe, Ozzy Osbourne, Bon Jovi, Skid Row and The Scorpions. This was the first time that an audience had been allowed to stand up and dance at a stadium rock concert in the Soviet Union.

1999 - The movie Detroit Rock City, which tells the story of Kiss fans on their way to a Kiss concert, opened nationwide.

2009 - Pioneering guitarist and songwriter Les Paul passed away in White Plains, N.Y., due to complications from pneumonia.

2012 - The London 2012 Olympics ended with a spectacular musical closing ceremony. The three-hour show featured some of the biggest names of British music from decades past, including the Spice Girls, George Michael, The Who, Muse, Madness, The Pet Shop Boys, Ray Davies, Liam Gallagher, and Brian May and Roger Taylor from Queen.

Birthdays:

Country singer Porter Wagoner was born today in 1927.

Country singer Buck Owens was born today in 1929.

Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits is 71.

Jerry Speiser of Men at Work is 67.

Pat Metheny is 66.

Jurgen Dehmel of Nena is 62.

Sir Mix-A-Lot is 57.

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