The Funniest People in Music: 250 Anecdotes

Some samples: 1) Blues singer Muddy Waters first heard his voice on a recording in the early 1940s. His impression of his voice was positive; afterward, he said, “I thought, man, this boy can sing the blues. And I was surprised because I didn’t know I sang like that.” 2)At age 13, William F. Buckley was sent to an English boarding school, where his piano teacher offered to teach him the first movement of Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata.” However, William’s old piano teacher had warned him that playing the “Moonlight Sonata” before one was ready was simply wrong; therefore, he wrote her for permission to learn to play its first movement. Quickly, he received a letter from her in reply, and she did not give him permission to learn the first movement. She explained that if one was unable to learn the third and difficult movement, then one should not learn the first movement. She also explained that the first movement required a “maturity” that William was too young to have acquired. Mr. Buckley writes that this letter helped teach him that “good music is a very serious business.” 3) Herman’s Hermits was a very popular pop group in the 1960s, recording such hits as “Mrs. Brown, You’ve Got a Lovely Daughter,” “Dandy,” and “I’m Henry VIII, I Am.” These days, they perform before nostalgic audiences often consisting of women in their 40s and 50s. According to lead singer Peter Noone, “Girls used to throw underwear at us. We still get some, but it’s bigger than it used to be.”