1877
The first sound recording is made. Inventor Thomas Alva Edison records "Mary Had a Little Lamb" (the poem, not the Stevie Ray Vaughan classic).

1927
Country singer Porter Wagoner is born. His No. 1 country singles are "A Satisfied Mind," "Misery Loves Company," and "Please Don't Stop Loving Me."

1929
Country great Buck Owens ("I've Got a Tiger by the Tail") is born in Sherman, Texas. As well as helping to invent the Bakersfield Sound, he later became a host of Hee Haw.
Buck Owens "Truck Drivin' Man" on Hee Haw

1949
Mark Knopfler, guitarist and vocalist for Dire Straits, is born in Glasgow, Scotland.
Mark Knopfler "Sultans of Swing" Live

1954
Pat Metheny, jazz guitarist and no fan of Kenny G, is born in Lee's Summit, Mo.
Pat Metheny "Last Train Home"

1956
Tonight on The Ed Sullivan Show you can see Ed welcome the Platters ("Only You").

1957
Frankie Lymon leaves the Teenagers to start his own solo career.

1959
Singer Suzanne Vega is born.

1960
Pete Best becomes the drummer for the Silver Beetles. Former drummer Tommy Moore had to give up the stool after taking a job as a forklift driver.

1961
Roy Hay, guitarist for Culture Club, is born in Southend, England.

1966
At San Francisco's Fillmore, it's a none-more-psychedelic double bill featuring the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane. Bring two tabs.

1967
Fleetwood Mac make their live debut at London's National Jazz & Blues Festival. Headliners for the festival are Donovan and Pink Floyd.

1967
Bobbie Gentry's great "Ode to Billy Joe" enters the top 40. It goes on to become her only No. 1.
Bobbie Gentry "Ode to Billy Joe"

1967
On American Bandstand, Diana Ross and the real Supremes perform "Reflections."
The Supremes "Reflections"

1969
The supergroup Blind Faith make their U.S. live debut at Madison Square Garden.
Blind Faith "Can't Find My Way Home" Live 1969

1970
Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, and others appear at a Woody Guthrie memorial concert held at the Hollywood Bowl.

1972
The Festival of Hope is the first rock festival to raise funds for an established charity. Acts include Jefferson Airplane, Stephen Stills, James Brown, and others. Only half of the expected 400,000 show up the second day and while they raked in $300,000, the festival incurred expenses of $400,000.

1972
Tonight on American Bandstand, it's a mellow show featuring Jim Croce.
Jim Croce "Operator"

1978
The Who’s press officer, Pete Meaden, 35, commits suicide by overdosing on barbiturates. Meaden was the manager of Townshend and company when they were the High Numbers. A dedicated mod, he introduced the band members to the lifestyle and, with the assistance of Who manager Kit Lambert, turned them into the subculture’s figureheads.

1981
Bob Dylan's long-delayed Shot of Love album is finally released.

1984
Who better to close the Los Angeles Olympic Games than Lionel Richie? He delights a packed coliseum by singing "All Night Long."
Lionel Richie "All Night Long"

1989
The Rolling Stones play a secret club gig at Toad's Place in New Haven, Conn. The band is warming up for its Steel Wheels tour. Joey Ramone and Darryl Hall get past Toad's velvet rope.
The Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter"

1992
The Grateful Dead announce they are canceling five shows in the Northwest so Jerry Garcia can recover from exhaustion.

1992
Modern composer and Sonic Youth mentor John Cage dies in New York.
John Cage "Water Walk" on I've Got a Secret

1993
The Red Hot Chili Peppers replace guitarist Arik Marshall with Jesse Tobias, who in turn is replaced by Dave Navarro three months later.

1993
One of Paula Abdul's former backup singers loses her suit, in which she claimed she sang most of the vocals on the 1988 hit album Forever Your Girl.

1994
"Woodstock '94" was held in Saugerties, New York. About 350,000 attended the show, which included mudfights and performances by Green Day, Nine Inch Nails, Aerosmith, and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

1995
A mass wake is held for Jerry Garcia at San Francisco's Golden Gate Park.

1995
Michael Stipe has an operation for a hernia. Hey, everybody hurts.....sometimes.
REM "Everybody Hurts"

1996
R&B singer Ginuwine releases "Pony," one of the most ridiculous singles ever recorded.

1997
Blues great Luther Allison, diagnosed with lung cancer and brain tumors July 10, dies in Wisconsin. Allison is 57.
Luther Allison "A Change Must Come" 1985

1997
Trisha Yearwood fans in Lynden, Wash., get an added treat when the singer is joined on stage by her occasional duet partner and friend, Garth Brooks. The two sing their hit song "In Another's Eyes."

1997
MTV debuts the Fleetwood Mac reunion concert. The special was taken from two performances at a Warner Brothers soundstage a few months earlier.
Fleetwood Mac "Dreams" 1997

1998
Scott Weiland, the lead singer of the Stone Temple Pilots, pleads guilty to felony heroin possession and is sentenced to three months in a drug treatment facility.
Stone Temple Pilots "Interstate Love Song"

1999
Representatives from the National Organization for Women’s (NOW) New York chapter demonstrate outside the office of Woodstock ‘99 promoter/producer John Scher to protest the violence against women that allegedly occurred at the July 23-25 event. Several rapes and numerous accounts of sexual harassment and assault were reported after the event.

1999
The state of Missouri celebrates Porter Wagoner Day, the country star's Birthdays (1927) in Howell County, Mo.

2003
eBay auctioneer Anthony DeFontes says he will sell Elvis Presley's tooth separately after the tooth combined with a lock of the King's hair and a gold record fails to attract a high enough bid.

2003
Pete Doherty of UK rockers the Libertines confesses he is addicted to crack cocaine and heroin after he is caught breaking into the London apartment of bandmate Carl Barat.

2003
Eve, self-proclaimed First Lady of the Ruff Ryders rap posse and a former stripper, denies she is in a pic of two women having sex which has surfaced on the internet.

2006
Up-their-own-topographic-ocean prog rockers The Mars Volta are bottled offstage at the U.S. Endfest festival.

August 12 Birthdays

• Thomas Bewick 1753
• Abbott Thayer 1849
• Christy Mathewson 1880
• Cecil B. DeMille 1881
• Cantinflas 1911
• Mario Moreno 1911
• Jane Wyatt 1912
• Michael Kidd 1919
• Majorie Reynolds 1921
• Joe Jones 1926
• John Derek 1926
• Porter Wagoner 1927
• Mstislav Rostropovich 1927
• Buck Owens 1929
• William Goldman 1931
• Parnelli Jones 1933
• Larry Ziegler 1939
• George Hamilton 1939
• Jennifer Warren 1941
• Mark Knopfler (Dire Straits) 1949
• Kid Creole 1950
• Pat Metheny 1954
• Sam J. Jones 1954
• Danny Shirley (Confederate Railroad) 1956
• Suzanne Vega 1959
• Roy Hay (Culture Club) 1961
• Sir Mix-A-Lot 1963
• Peter Krause 1965
• Pete Sampras 1971
• Casey Affleck 1975
• Bill Uechi (Save Ferris) 1975
• Dominique Swain 1980

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