History Highlight:

Today in 1978, Prince released his debut album For You. The album had the singles "Soft and Wet" and "Just as Long as We're Together". Prince has sold over 100 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling artists of all time. He has won seven Grammy Awards, a Golden Globe, and an Academy Award, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004. We miss him dearly, and this album is where it all began.

Also, Today In:

1956 - The CBS Radio Network premiered the first regularly scheduled national broadcast rock 'n' roll show, Alan Freed's Rock 'n' Roll Dance Party.

1962 - Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and early Rolling Stones pal Dick Taylor met Brian Jones for the first time at the Ealing Club, a London spot where Brit blues lovers liked to hang out.

1969 - John and Yoko recorded "Give Peace A Chance" in their Toronto hotel room during one of their bed-ins for peace.

1970 - B.J. Thomas wins the Academy Award for Best Original Song for "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head" from the 1969 film Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The song was written by Hal David and Burt Bacharach, and hit No. 1 on the U.S. charts.

1973 - Diana Ross started a two-week run at No. 1 on the U.S. album chart with Lady Sings The Blues.

1984 - A second British Invasion? Forty of the artists on the U.S. Top 100 singles chart were Brits - a new record.

1994 - Courtney Love was arrested on drug and theft charges after a reported overdose. At this time, Love was unaware that her husband Kurt Cobain was dead at their home (his body wasn't discovered until April 8 by an electrician who had arrived to install a security system at their house).

1998 - George Michael was arrested for disorderly conduct at a park restroom in Beverly Hills, CA after an undercover officer observed Michael performing a "lewd act." Michael plead no contest to the charge and was sentenced to community service.

2008 - Bob Dylan got an honorary Pulitzer Prize for his "profound impact on popular music and American culture." He was the first Rock musician to win the award.

2008 - Feist won five prizes, including Album of the Year at the Junos, Canada's top music awards. The Canadian singer-songwriter won single of the year for "1234," Album and Pop Album for The Reminder, as well as Artist and Songwriter of the Year.

2014 - 25-year-old Peaches Geldof, daughter of the Live Aid mastermind Bob Geldof, was found dead in Kent, England. The official cause of death was a drug overdose. Tragically, her mother, Paula Yates, died from similar causes in 2000, when Peaches was 11.

2016 - Jimmie Van Zant died in a hospice in Florida after several years of treatment for liver cancer. He began playing guitar and piano as a child, mentored by his cousin Ronnie Van Zant, but largely gave up music until the 1977 plane crash in which Ronnie, the founder and lead singer of Lynyrd Skynyrd, was killed. He then took up a career playing Southern rock music.

2016 - Bruce Springsteen cancelled a concert in North Carolina, joining business groups in condemning a state law that rolled back protection for gay and transgender people. In a statement Springsteen said, "Some things are more important than a rock show and this fight against prejudice and bigotry which is happening as I write is one of them."

Birthdays:

Billie Holiday was born today in 1915.

Ravi Shankar was born today in 1920.

Drummer and founding member of the Grateful Dead Bill Kreutzmann is 74.

Florian Schneider-Esleben of Kraftwerk is 73.

John Oates of Hall and Oates is 72.

Grammy award winning American singer/songwriter Janis Ian is 69. She went to No. 1 in 1975 with her song "At Seventeen".

Highlights for Today in Music History are gathered from This Day in Music, Paul Shaffer's Day in Rock, Song Facts and Wikipedia.