Died On This Date (September 13, 2011) Richard Hamilton / Designed The Beatles’ White Album
themusicsover Richard Hamilton
February 24, 1922 – September 13, 2011
Richard Hamilton was a British artist who specialized in painting and collage. Known as the Father of Pop Art, and Britain’s answer to Andy Warhol, Hamilton made more than one lasting mark on popular music. During the mid ’60s, he became friends with Paul McCartney who eventually asked him to design the cover of what became the Beatles’ 1968 masterpiece The Beatles, known also as the White Album. It was Hamilton who came up with the simple yet iconic mostly plain white cover and inside collage. Prior to that, Hamilton issued a series of prints entitled Swinging London which featured shots of the Rolling Stones’ Mick Jagger as he was being arrested on drug charges. Richard Hamilton was 89 when he passed away on September 13, 2011.
Thanks to Scott Miller for the assist.
Jane Scott was, simply put, a rock critic’s rock critic. For 50 years, she covered nearly every major concert that came through Cleveland, Ohio for the city’s major daily, the Plain Dealer. Born in Cleveland, Scott graduated from the University of Michigan and served in the U.S. Navy before taking up a career in journalism. In March of 1952, just three days after Cleveland DJ, Alan Freed put on what has been called the world’s first rock concert, Scott was hired by the Plain Dealer to cover local society events. In 1958, she took over a column that was aimed at what now would be called “tweens,” and soon morphed it into one of the world’s first rock columns. Scott’s earliest major rock story came in 1964 when she covered the Beatles‘ first show at Cleveland’s Public Hall. She soon found herself covering the band’s tour through Europe. When the Fab Four returned to Cleveland in 1966, it was Scott who scored one of Paul McCartney’s first American interviews ever. By her retirement in 2002, Scott estimated that she had been to over 10,000 concerts, and along the way she earned the love, friendship and respect from everyone from Mick Jagger to Jim Morrison to David Bowie to Bob Dylan. So beloved by the rock community, it took her 80th birthday celebration in 1999 to reunite the Raspberries. And to help celebrate the occasion, Glenn Frey of the Eagles sent a note saying “Jane, you never met a band you didn’t like,” while 
David Mason was a classically trained trumpet player who is perhaps best remembered for his iconic solo on the Beatles’ hit, “Penny Lane.” Mason was born in London and studied music at the Royal College of Music where he went on to teach of some 30 years. He eventually became the featured trumpet in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the English Chamber Orchestra, among others. In 1967, while the Beatles were working on Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, Paul McCartney caught a performance by Mason on television. That next day, producer George Martin invited Mason to come down to the studio and play on “Penny Lane,” which would become one of the Beatles most beloved songs. It is Mason’s piccolo trumpet that can be heard prominently in the song that would ultimately make it on to the Magical Mystery Tour album. David Mason died of leukemia on April 29, 2011. He was 85.
Captain Beefheart was a respected, innovative, and highly influential rock musician who launched his 40-year career in 1964. A multi-instrumentalist with a powerful voice, Beefheart found himself at the top 1960s avant-garde rock heap. He was a high school classmate of 
