Today CLXXXIV

Birthdays:

• Samuel Taylor Coleridge, poet, critic, and philosopher, one of the founders of the Romantic Movement in England, and one of the Lake Poets, October 21, 1772 – July 25, 1834


• Giuseppe Baini, priest, music critic, and composer of church music, October 21, 1775 – May 21, 1844


• Alfred Bernhard Nobel, chemist, engineer, innovator, armaments manufacturer, and the inventor of dynamite; in his last will, he used his enormous fortune to institute the Nobel Prizes; the synthetic element Nobelium was named after him, October 21, 1833 – December 10, 1896


• György Stern, aka Sir Georg Solti, KBE, orchestral and operatic conductor, learned the piano and studied at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music; General Music Director, Bavarian State Opera from 1946 to 1952; Music Director, Dallas Symphony Orchestra from 1961 to 1962; Music Director, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden from 1961 to 1971; Music Director, Chicago Symphony Orchestra from 1969 to 1991; Music Director, Orchestre de Paris from 1972 to 1975; Principal Conductor, London Philharmonic Orchestra from 1979 to 1983, October 21, 1912 - September 5, 1997


• Martin Gardner, mathematics and science writer, specializing in recreational mathematics, with interests encompassing magic (conjuring), pseudoscience, literature, philosophy, and religion, who wrote the Mathematical Games column in Scientific American from 1956 to 1981, and has published over 60 books, 1914


• John Birks DIZZY Gillespie, jazz trumpeter, bandleader, singer, and composer, a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz, instrumental in founding Afro-Cuban jazz; he was a practitioner of the Bahá'í faith, October 21, 1917 – January 6, 1993


• Sir Malcolm Henry Arnold, KBE, musician and composer, began his career as a professional trumpeter, but was composing full-time by the time he was thirty; he was a composer of light music in works such as his sets of Welsh, English, Scottish, Irish, and Cornish Dances, and the scores to the St Trinian's films, and Hobson's Choice, October 21, 1921 - September 23, 2006


• Úrsula Hilaria CELIA Caridad Cruz Alfonso, salsa singer, one of the most successful Cuban performers of the 20th century, with twenty-three gold albums to her name; the Queen of Salsa, October 21, 1925 – July 16, 2003


• Edward Charles WHITEY Ford, former MLB pitcher, who played his entire 16-year career as a New York Yankee, retiring in 1967; in 1961, he won the Cy Young Award, and the World Series MVP; he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974, 1928


• Ursula Kroeber Le Guin, author of novels, poetry, children's books, and essays, and science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories, known for her exploration of Taoist, anarchist, feminist, psychological, and sociological themes; she has received several Hugo and Nebula awards, and was awarded the Gandalf Grand Master award in 1979 and the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America Grand Master Award in 2003, 1929


• Carl Thomas Brewer, NHL defenseman, October 21, 1938 - August 25, 2001


• Manfred Lubowitz, aka Manfred Mann, keyboard player, leader of bands Manfred Mann and Manfred Mann's Earth Band, 1940


• Stephen Lee STEVE Cropper, musician, guitarist, songwriter, and producer, a founding member of Booker T. & the MG's, 1941


• Elvin Bishop,blues and rock and roll musician and guitar player, 1942


• Benjamin Netanyahu, the 9th Prime Minister of Israel, 1949


• Brent Mydland, musician and songwriter, the fourth keyboardist for the Grateful Dead, October 21, 1952 – July 26, 1990


• Carrie Frances Fisher, actress, screenwriter, and novelist, known for her role as Princess Leia in the original Star Wars trilogy, 1956


• Wolfgang Ketterle Ph.D., physicist and professor of physics, shared the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics with Eric Allin Cornell and Carl Wieman, 1957


• Steven Lee STEVE Lukather, session musician, songwriter, arranger, producer, and guitar player, known as a member of Toto, and as a solo artist, 1957


• Ken Watanabe, theatre, TV, and film actor, 1959


• Jon Carin, session and backing musician, producer, engineer, writer, and programmer, who plays keyboards, guitar, bass guitar, and drums, and sings, 1964


• Lera Auerbach, composer, 1973


• Gabriel Jordan GABE Gross, MLB left fielder, currently with the Milwaukee Brewers, 1979

RIP:

• Henry Lawes, musician and composer, December 5, 1595 - October 21, 1662


• Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson, KB, naval officer, famous for his participation in the Napoleonic Wars, most notably in the Battle of Trafalgar, September 29, 1758 – 21 October 21, 1805


• William BILL Patton Black, Jr., musician, played upright bass with guitarist Scotty Moore on Elvis Presley's That's All Right (Mama); played bass on early Presley recordings, eventually becoming one of the first bass players to use the electric bass in popular music - on Jailhouse Rock in the late 1950's; continued to work with Presley until 1958; joined a Memphis group that evolved into Bill Black's Combo in 1959; their instrumental Smokie, released late that year, made the Top Ten; they had eight singles in the Top 40 between 1959 and 1962, September 17, 1926 – October 21, 1965


• Jack Kerouac, novelist, writer, poet, artist, and part of the Beat Generation, March 12, 1922 – October 21, 1969


• Waclaw Franciszek Sierpinski, mathematician, known for his contributions to set theory, number theory, theory of functions, and topology; he published over 50 books and 700 papers , March 14, 1882 — October 21, 1969


• François Roland Truffaut, screenwriter, director, producer, and actor, one of the founders of the French New Wave in filmmaking, February 6, 1932 – October 21, 1984


• Maxene Anglyn Andrews, vocalist, provided the high harmony for The Andrews Sisters, January 3, 1916 - October 21, 1995