mick laBriola

Harvey Fuqua (July 27, 1929 – July 6, 2010) was an American rhythm and blues singer, songwriter, record producer, and record label executive. Fuqua founded the seminal R&B/doo-wop group the Moonglows in the 1950s. He is notable as one of the key figures in the development of the Motown label in Detroit, Michigan. His group gave Marvin Gaye a start in his music career. Fuqua and his wife at the time, Gwen Gordy, distributed the first Motown hit single, Barrett Strong‘s “Money (That’s What I Want)“, on their record label, Anna Records. Fuqua later sold Anna Records to Gwen’s brother Berry Gordy and became a songwriter and executive at Motown. He was the nephew of Charlie Fuqua of the Ink Spots and the uncle of the filmmaker Antoine Fuqua.

Fuqua was born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States. He was the nephew of Charlie Fuqua of the Ink Spots. In 1951, with Bobby Lester, Alexander Graves and Prentiss Barnes, he formed a vocal group, the Crazy Sounds, in Louisville, later moving with other members of the group to Cleveland, Ohio. There they were taken under the wing of disc jockey Alan Freed, who renamed them the Moonglows, after his own nickname, Moondog”. The Moonglows’ first releases were for Freed’s Champagne label in 1953. They then recorded for the Chance label in Chicago, before signing with Chess Records in 1954. Their single “Sincerely” reached number 1 on the Billboard R&B chart and number 20 on the Hot 100 in late 1954.

Today’s Doodle, illustrated by Trinidad & Tobago-based artist Nicholas Huggins, celebrates the steelpan, a percussion instrument made of metal, created and influenced by Trinbagonians. It’s the only acoustic instrument invented in the twentieth century, but has origins dating back to the 1700’s. It was a staple during Carnival and Canboulay, the annual harvest festivals celebrated in Trinidad, and is still used in contemporary music. On this day in 1951, the Trinidad All-Steel Pan Percussion Orchestra (TASPO) performed at the Festival of Britain, introducing the steelpan and a new music genre to the world.

When enslaved Africans were brought to Trinidad by colonialists in the 1700’s, they brought over their African heritage and traditions of rhythmic drumming with them. When slavery was abolished between 1834 and 1838, Trinidadians joined in on Carnival festivities with their drums. However in 1877, government officials banned their drumming because they feared that the drumming would be used to send messages that would inspire rebellion. In protest of this ban, musicians started to pound tuned bamboo tubes on the ground as alternatives to mimic the sound of their drums. These ensembles were called Tamboo Bamboo bands.

Another ban came in 1930, when rival Tamboo Bamboo bands would cause disturbances during Carnival and other street festivals. These bands then looked to a new alternative to carry their rhythm: metal objects such as car parts, paint pots, dustbins, biscuit tins and thus the idea of the pan was born.

During World War II, Carnival was forbidden due to security reasons, and musicians began experimenting with the unique instrument to improve the sound quality. Overtime, dents were hammered into the surface of these objects, which played different notes depending on the size, position and shape. In 1948, after the war ended, the musicians switched to using the 55 gallon oil drums discarded by the oil refineries. In addition to changing the shape of the drum surface, they found that changing the length of the drum allowed complete scales from bass to soprano. This formed the basis for the modern version of the pan. The steelpan grew and developed into a legitimate instrument through the likes of pioneers and innovators such as Winston “Spree” Simon, Ellie Mannette, Anthony Williams and Bertie Marshall. Many of their innovations and techniques are still used today.

The steelpan is now the national instrument of Trinidad and Tobago, and is a source of great pride and true resilience for its citizens. Steelpans are now enjoyed in concert calls like Royal Albert Hall, Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center and more. Whether in the UK or Japan, Senegal or the States, the steelpan is an internationally recognized instrument that reminds listeners of its island origins.

NGC 2170 is a reflection nebula in the constellation Monoceros. It was discovered on October 16, 1784 by William Herschel.

Sir Michael Philip Jagger (born 26 July 1943) is an English singer, songwriter, actor, and film producer who has achieved international fame as the lead vocalist and one of the founder members of the Rolling Stones. His ongoing songwriting partnership with Keith Richards is one of the most successful in history. Jagger’s career has spanned over six decades, and he has been widely described as one of the most popular and influential frontmen in the history of rock & roll. His distinctive voice and energetic live performances, along with Richards’ guitar style, have been the Rolling Stones’ trademark throughout the band’s career. Jagger gained press notoriety for his romantic involvements and illicit drug use, and was often portrayed as a countercultural figure.

Jagger was born and grew up in Dartford, England. He studied at the London School of Economics before abandoning his studies to join the Rolling Stones. Jagger has written most of the Rolling Stones’ songs together with Richards, and they continue to collaborate musically. In the late 1960s, Jagger starred in the films Performance (1970) and Ned Kelly (1970), to a mixed reception. In the 2000s, he co-founded a film production company, Jagged Films, and through them has produced feature films, beginning with the 2001 historical drama Enigma. He began a solo recording career in 1985, releasing his first album, She’s the Boss, and joined the electric supergroup SuperHeavy in 2009. Relationships with the Stones’ members, particularly Richards, deteriorated during the 1980s, but Jagger has always found more success with the band than with his solo and side projects. He was married to Bianca Jagger from 1971 to 1978, and has had several other relationships, resulting in eight children with five women.

In 1989, Jagger was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and into the UK Music Hall of Fame with the Rolling Stones in 2004. As a member of the Rolling Stones, and as a solo artist, he reached No. 1 on the UK and US singles charts with 13 singles, the top 10 with 32 singles and the top 40with 70 singles. In 2003, he was knighted for his services to popular music. The genus Jaggermeryx naida and the type species Aegrotocatellus jaggeri are named for him. Jagger is credited with bringing style and sexiness to rock and roll and with being a trailblazer in pop music that subsequent generations of musicians have followed.

Charles Lawrence Persip (July 26, 1929 – August 23, 2020), known as Charli Persip and formerly as Charlie Persip (he changed the spelling of his name to Charli in the early 1980s), was an American jazz drummer.

Born in Morristown, New Jersey, United States, and raised in Newark, New Jersey, Persip attended West Side High School, preferring it over Newark Arts High School because he wanted to join the former’s football team. He later studied drums with Al Germansky in Newark. After playing with Tadd Dameron in 1953, he gained recognition as a jazz drummer as he toured and recorded with Dizzy Gillespie’s big and small bands between 1953 and 1958. He then joined Harry “Sweets” Edison’s quintet and later the Harry James Orchestra before forming his own group, the Jazz Statesmen, with Roland Alexander, Freddie Hubbard, and Ron Carter in 1960. Around this time, Persip also recorded with other jazz musicians, including Lee Morgan, Melba Liston, Kenny Dorham, Zoot Sims, Red Garland, Gil Evans, Don Ellis, Eric Dolphy, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, Gene Ammons and the singer Dinah Washington. Persip was also the drummer on the “Eternal Triangle” recording, Sonny Side Up (Verve, 1957), featuring Sonny Rollins and Sonny Stitt. From 1960 to 1973 he toured as a drummer and conductor with Billy Eckstine.

This luminescent image features multiple galaxies, perhaps most noticeably LEDA 58109, the lone galaxy in the upper right. LEDA 58109 is flanked by two further galactic objects to its lower left — an active galactic nucleus (AGN) called SDSS J162558.14+435746.4 that partially obscures the galaxy SDSS J162557.25+435743.5, which appears to poke out to the right behind the AGN.  Galaxy classification is sometimes presented as something of a dichotomy: spiral and elliptical. However, the diversity of galaxies in this image alone highlights the complex web of galaxy classifications that exist, including galaxies that house extremely luminous AGNs at their cores, and galaxies whose shapes defy the classification of either spiral or elliptical.  The sample of galaxies here also illustrates the wide variety of names that galaxies have: some relatively short, like LEDA 58109, and some very long and challenging to remember, such as the two galaxies to the left. This is due to the variety of cataloguing systems that chart the celestial objects in the night sky. No one catalogue is exhaustive, and they cover overlapping regions of the sky, so that many galaxies belong to several different catalogues. For example, the galaxy on the right is LEDA 58109 in the LEDA galaxy database, but is also known as MCG+07-34-030 in the MCG galaxy catalogue, and SDSS J162551.50+435747.5 in the SDSS galaxy catalogue — the same catalogue that also lists the two galaxies to the left.

William “Benny” Benjamin (July 25, 1925 – April 20, 1969), nicknamed Papa Zita, was an American musician, most notable as the primary drummer for the Motown studio band known as The Funk Brothers. He was a native of Birmingham, Alabama.

Benjamin originally learned to play drums in the style of the big band jazz groups in the 1940s. In 1958, Benjamin was Motown’s first studio drummer, where he was noted for his dynamic style. Several Motown record producers, including Berry Gordy, refused to work on any recording sessions unless Benjamin was the drummer and James Jamerson was the bassist. The Beatles singled out Benjamin’s drumming style upon meeting Gordy in the UK. Among the Motown songs Benjamin performed the drum tracks for are early hits such as “Money (That’s What I Want)” by Barrett Strong, “Shop Around” by The Miracles and “Do You Love Me” by The Contours; as well as later hits such as “Get Ready” and “My Girl” by The Temptations, “Uptight (Everything’s Alright)” by Stevie Wonder, “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” by Gladys Knight & the Pips, and “Going to a Go-Go” by The Miracles.

Benjamin was influenced by the work of drummers Buddy Rich and Tito Puente. He recorded with a studio set composed of Ludwig, Slingerland, Rogers and Gretschcomponents and probably Zildjian cymbals.

By the late 1960s, Benjamin struggled with drug and alcohol addiction, and fellow Funk Brothers Uriel Jones and Richard “Pistol” Allen increasingly recorded more of the drum tracks for the studio’s releases. Benjamin died on April 20, 1969, of a stroke at age 43.^[7]

Benjamin was inducted into the “Sidemen” category of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003. He was named the eleventh best drummer of all time by the Rolling Stone magazine in 2016.