Today LXXXV - RIP Red Buttons

Birthdays:

• George Louis Francois Zenon, aka George Lewis, jazz clarinetist, July 13, 1900 – December 31, 1969


• Dave Garroway, founding host of the Today Show, one of the pioneers of television talk, July 13, 1913 - July 21, 1982


• Ernest Gold, composer, won an Academy Award for his score for Exodus, Gold wrote nearly 100 film/television scores between 1945 and 1992, classical works include a piano concerto, a string quartet, and a piano sonata, July 13, 1921 - March 17, 1999


• Carlo Bergonzi, tenor, famous for roles in Giuseppe Verdi's operas, 1924


• Robert Edward 'Bob' Crane, disc jockey and actor, July 13, 1928 – June 29, 1978


• Alan Civil, [French] horn player, principal with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Philharmonia, and BBC Symphony Orchestra, played the horn solo on the Beatles song "For No One" on the Revolver album, June 13, 1929 – March 19, 1989


• Akinwande Oluwole 'Wole' Soyinka, writer and playwright, winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Literature, 1934


• Albert Ayler, jazz saxophonist, singer, and composer, exponent of free jazz, July 13, 1936 – November 1970


• Patrick Stewart, OBE, film, television, stage, and voice actor, and Chancellor of Huddersfield University, famous for Shakespearean roles, and as Captain Jean-Luc Picard and Professor Xavier, 1940


• Harrison Ford, actor, 1942


• James Joseph McGuinn III, aka Roger McGuinn, singer-songwriter and guitarist, singer and lead guitarist for The Byrds, solo artist, 1942


• Ernő Rubik, inventor, sculptor, and professor of architecture, inventor of Rubik's Cube, 1944


• Richard Anthony "Cheech" Marin, comedian and actor, once part of Cheech and Chong, 1946


• Cameron Bruce Crowe, writer and film director, 1957


• Neal Foulds, professional snooker player and commentator, 1963


• Barry Pinches, professional snooker player, 1970

RIP:

• Rashi, Hebrew acronym for Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki or Rabbi Shlomo Yarchi, author of the first comprehensive commentaries on the Talmud and Tanakh, February 22, 1040 – July 13, 1105


• James Bradley, astronomer, Astronomer Royal from 1742, known for discovering the aberration of light, March 1693 – July 13, 1762


• Arnold Franz Walter Schoenberg, composer, painter, music theorist, and teacher of composition, among the first composers to embrace atonal motivic development, innovator of the twelve-tone technique, September 13, 1874 – July 13, 1951


• Magdalena Carmen Frieda Kahlo y Calderón, aka Frida Kahlo, painter, July 6, 1907 – July 13, 1954


• he Right Honourable Patrick Maynard Stuart Blackett, Baron Blackett, OM, CH, FRS, experimental physicist known for his work on cloud chambers, cosmic rays, and paleomagnetism, winner of the 1948 Nobel Prize for Physics, for his investigation of cosmic rays, President of the Royal Society from 1965 to 1970, November 18, 1897 – July 13, 1974


• Gabrielle Roy, CC , FRSC, author, March 22, 1909 – July 13, 1983


• Yousuf Karsh, CC, photographer, one the world's most accomplished portrait photographers, December 23, 1908 – July 13, 2002


• Máximo Francisco Repilado Muñoz, aka Compay Segundo, musician and songwriter, and inventor of the armónico, a seven-stringed guitar-like instrument, whose most famous composition is Chan Chan, to whom international fame came in 1997 with the release of the Buena Vista Social Club album and movie, November 18, 1907 – July 13, 2003


• Karl Ludwig Kleiber, aka Carlos Kleiber, conductor, July 3, 1930 - July 13, 2004


• Aaron Chwatt, aka Red Buttons, burlesque comedian, TV star, and dramatic actor, won the 1957 Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in Sayonara, which led to other films; in 1982, The Friars Club honoured him with a star-filled roast and a life-time achievement award, Feb. 15, 1919 - July 13, 2006