1977 in music
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| … 1974 • 1975 • 1976 – 1977 – 1978 • 1979 • 1980 … … 1940s • 1950s • 1960s – 1970s – 1980s • 1990s • 2000s … … 19 century – 20 century – 21 century … |
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Events
Bohemian Rhapsody is named 'The Best Single Of The Last 25 Years' by BPI.
In this year, the St. Magnus Festival was founded in Orkney by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies. The Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe began its annual festival based on the music of George Frideric Handel.
The soundtrack to the film Saturday Night Fever was an enormous hit that established the Bee Gees (who had composed most of the tracks) as the most popular artists in the world, and the best-selling artist since the Beatles. Saturday Night Fever also moved disco music into the mainstream, and it dominated the charts for the next few years.
1977 marked the first year since his debut, Empty Sky that Elton John does not release a studio album.
Jimmy Buffett's Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes is also especially notable in its inclusion of "Margaritaville", the biggest single of his career. This album helped establish Buffett as a popular artist, and earned him much of the rabid fanbase ("Parrotheads") for which he eventually became known.
Billy Joel's The Stranger was enormously popular, and includes his hits, "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)", "Just the Way You Are", "Only the Good Die Young", and his beloved medley "Scenes from an Italian Restaurant".
Fleetwood Mac's Rumours is the most popular and critically acclaimed LP of the band's career; it is one of the best-selling albums of all time.
- January 1 - The Clash headline the gala opening of the London music club, The Roxy.
- January 12 - Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards is fined 750 pounds for possession of cocaine which was found in his wrecked car on May 19, 1976. Richards was charged an additional 250 pounds for court costs and found "not guilty" of possession of LSD.
- January 26
- Patti Smith falls off the stage while opening for Bob Seger in Tampa, Florida. Smith is rushed to the hospital for 22 stitches to close head lacerations. While recovering, Smith writes her fifth book of poetry, Babel.
- Fleetwood Mac's original lead guitarist, Peter Green, is committed to a mental hospital in England after firing a pistol at a delivery boy bringing him a royalties check.
- Alice Cooper enters rehab for his alcoholism, after ten years of drinking a pack of beer a day.
- January 27 - After releasing only one single for the band, EMI terminates its contract with the Sex Pistols.
- February 4 - American Bandstand celebrates its 25th anniversary on television with a special hosted by Dick Clark. An "all-star band" made up of Chuck Berry, Seals & Crofts, Gregg Allman, Junior Walker, Johnny Rivers, the Pointer Sisters, Charlie Daniels, Doc Severinsen, Les McCann, Donald Byrd, Chuck Mangione and three members of Booker T and the MGs perform "Roll Over Beethoven."
- February 14 - The B-52's make their debut at a party in Athens, Georgia
- February 15 - Sid Vicious replaces Glen Matlock as the bassist for the Sex Pistols.
- February 27 - Royal Canadian Mounted Police raid Keith Richards' Toronto hotel suite while he is sleeping and seize 22 grams of heroin, 5 grams of cocaine and narcotics paraphernalia. Richards is arrested and charged with possession of heroin with intent to traffic, and possession of cocaine. He is released on $25,000 bail.
- March 1 - Sara Lowndes Dylan files for divorce from her husband of 11 years, Bob Dylan.
- March 10 - A&M Records signs the Sex Pistols in a ceremony in front of Buckingham Palace. The contract is terminated on March 16.
- April 22 - Pink Floyd opened the North American leg of their "Animals" tour in Miami, Florida.
- April 24 - Several artists, including Joan Baez and Santana, perform at a free concert for the inmates of California's Soledad Prison.
- April 25 - During a concert at the Saginaw, Michigan Civic Center, Elvis Presley makes what would turn out to be the last recordings he would ever make. Three songs recorded at the show would later appear (with overdubs), on the album, Moody Blue.
- April 26 - New York's disco Studio 54 opens.
- May 7 - Having been postponed from April 2 because of a BBC technicians' strike, the 22nd Eurovision Song Contest finally goes ahead in London's Wembley Conference Centre. France wins with Marie Myriam and the song "L'Oiseau et l'Enfant".
- May 11 - The Stranglers and support band London start a 10 week national UK tour.
- June - Founding of the Nikikai Opera Foundation.
- June 12 - The Supremes performed for the last time together at Drury Lane Theatre in London and officially disbanded.
- June 22 - Kiss are elected "most popular band in America" by a Gallup poll.
- July 9 - Donna Summer's hit record "I Feel Love" is released in the UK. It was massively influential in pop music as it was the first hit record ever to have an entirely synthesised backing track and helped propel the use of synthesisers in music greatly, especially in the 1980s.
- July 24 - Led Zeppelin perform in Oakland at their last ever concert in the United States.
- August 16 - Elvis Presley is found dead at his home Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee.
- August 17 - Florists Transworld Delivery (FTD) reported that in one day the number of orders for flowers to be delivered to Graceland for the funeral of Elvis Presley had surpassed the number for any other event in the company's history.
- September 16 - T.Rex frontman Marc Bolan is killed in an automobile accident.
- October 20 - A plane carrying Lynyrd Skynyrd crashes in Mississippi, killing songwriter & vocalist Ronnie Van Zant, guitarist Steve Gaines and background vocalist Cassie Gaines.
- December 14 - Saturday Night Fever appears in theaters, igniting a new popularity for disco music.
- Luigi Sagrati becomes president of the Unione Musicisti di Roma.
- Kenny Rogers releases his album "Ten Years of Gold" less than 12 months after scoring his first solo hit, following the break up of his pop/country band, The First Edition. The album features the original versions of his recent solo hits and re-recordings of First Edition classics.
- The Meters break up
- The Cars sign a contract with Elektra Records
- Devo signs a contract with Warner Bros.
- Midnight Oil sign a contract with CBS Records
- The Neville Brothers sign a contract with A&M Records
- The Police sign a contract with A&M Records
- Van Halen signs a contract with Warner Bros.
- Van Morrison releases a new album after a three-year absence
- Luv', a Dutch girl group, is formed