01-20 - Ozzy Osbourne bites the head off of a live bat thrown at him during a performance. Osbourne is hospitalized with rabies.
01-21 - B.B. King donates his personal record collection, which includes nearly 7,000 rare blues records, to the University of Mississippi's Center for the Study of Southern Culture.
03-04 - Frank Zappa's son Dweezil and daughter Moon Unit form Fred Zeppelin.
03-18 - Teddy Pendergrass is severely injured in a car accident in Philadelphia. Pendergrass' injuries result in him being paralyzed from the waist down
03-19 - Ozzy Osbourne's lead guitarist, Randy Rhoads is killed in a freak accident in Leesburg, Florida when the plane he's riding in buzzes Osbourne's tour bus and crashes into a house. The plane's pilot and a female passenger are also killed.
03-29 - Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney release their single "Ebony and Ivory", which will remain at #1 for 7 weeks
03-31 - The Doobie Brothers announce that they are breaking up
04-15 - Billy Joel is seriously injured in a motorcycle accident in Long Island, New York. Joel spends over a month in the hospital undergoing physical therapy for his hand.
04-26 - Rod Stewart is mugged in Los Angeles, California. Stewart loses his $50,000 Porsche to the mugger, but was not hurt.
06-06 - At the start of the US 'Peace Week' Tom Petty, Crosby Stills & Nash, Bob Dylan, Stevie Wonder, Stevie Nicks and Jackson Browne all appeared at The Rose Bowl, Pasadena, California to a crowd of 85,000 fans.
06-07 - Elvis Presley's Memphis home, Graceland, opened for public tours
06-15 - Pete Farndon bass player with The Pretenders was fired from the group, he went on to form a group with Topper Headon from The Clash.
06-19 - Riders in the Sky joined the Grand Ole Opry
06-23 - First performance of Vincent Persichetti's Harpsichord Sonata No. 2. Harpsichordist Elaine Comparone in Cleveland, OH.
06-25 - Lew Dewitt retired from the Statlers Brothers
06-30 - Alabama's "My Home's In Alabama" album certified platinum
07-03 - Don't You Want Me recorded by The Human League begins a run of 3 weeks at #1 on the US charts.
07-03 - Rosanna recorded by Toto peaks at #2 on the Top 100 chart for 5 weeks.
07-23 - First performance of John Harbison's Variation for clarinet, violin and piano by clarinetist David Satz, violinist Rose Mary Harbison, and pianist Ursula Oppens at the Sante Fe Chamber Music Festival,Sante Fe, NM.
07-24 - Eye of the Tiger recorded by Survivor begins a run of 6 weeks at #1 on Billboard's Hot 100.
07-31 - First performance of George Rochberg's opera The Confidence Man based on the novel by Hermann Melville, at the Sante Fe Opera, NM.
08-07 - Hurts So Good recorded by John Cougar peaks at #2 on the Top 100 chart for 4 weeks.
08-17 - In Langenhagen near Hanover, Germany began the first mass production of the compact disc.
08-22 - Premiere of Peter Maxwell Davies' "Image, Reflection, Shadow" at the Lucerne Festival in Switzerland
08-28 - George Strait scored first No. 1 single, "Fool Hearted Memory"
09-07 - The musical Cats begins its 18 year run on Broadway.
09-17 - Premiere of Steve Reich's "Tehillim" (orchestral version), by New York Philharmonic conducted by Zubin Mehta.
