April 4th is the birthday of composer Elmer Bernstein (1922-2004) whom I am always confusing with another composer, whose name escapes me. (Perhaps I'm thinking of
Elmer Schoebel, the jazz pianist who got his start in Champaign, Il. movie houses and wrote the Great American Standard Copenhagen. HAH, I'll bet you didn't know THAT!) He (Elmer, not the other guy) scored over 200 movies (okay, maybe some were tv shows, but still....) and not one of them is named West Side Story, or East or North or...well, you get the idea. He did that theme for The Magnificent Seven which everybody knew until cigarette commercials went off the air (figure that connection out!).
Muddy Waters has his birthday today as well, or at least used to. I don't confuse him with any other Mississippi Delta Blues guys, so there's hope. He is the legend of Chicago blues and since the word Chicago comes from (shikaakwa) refers to something about an onion swamp, having a guy named Muddy Waters around the area just makes sense, in some sort of cosmic way.