3 . When Elvis Presley died on August 16th, 1977, radio and television programs all over the world were interrupted to give the news of his death. President Carter declared a day of national mourning. Carter said, "Elvis Presley changed the face of American popular culture...He was unique and irreplaceable." Eighty thousand people attended his funeral. The streets were jammed with cars, and Elvis Presley films were shown on television, and his records were played on the radio all day. In the year after his death, one hundred million Presley LPs(密纹唱片)were sold.

Elvis Presley was born on January 8th, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi. His parents were very poor and Elvis never had music lessons, but he was surrounded by music from an early age. His parents were very religious, and Elvis regularly sang at church services. In 1948, when he was thirteen, his family moved to Memphis, Tennessee. He left school in 1953 and got a job as a truck driver.

In the summer of 1953, Elvis paid four dollars and recorded a song for his mother's birthday at Sam Phillips' Sun Records studio. Sam Phillips heard Elvis and asked him to record That's All Right. Twenty thousand copies were sold. He made five more records for Sun. Then in July 1955, he met Colonel Tom Parker, who became his manager in November. On January 10th, 1956, Elvis recorded Heartbreak Hotel, and a million copies were sold. In the next fourteen months, he made another fourteen records, and they were all big hits. In 1956, he also made his first film in Hollywood.

In March 1958, Elvis had to join the army. He wanted to be an ordinary soldier. When his hair was cut, thousands of women cried. He spent the next two years in Germany, where he met Priscilla Beaulieu, who became his wife eight years later on May 1st, 1967. In 1960, he left the army and went to Hollywood where he made several films during the next few years.

By 1968 many people had become tired of Elvis. He hadn't performed live since 1960, but he recorded a new LP From Elvis in Memphis and appeared in a special television program. He became popular again, and went to Las Vegas, where he was paid seven hundred fifty thousand dollars for four weeks. In August of 1977, he died from a heart attack. He has been working too hard, and eating and drinking too much for several years. He left all his money to his only daughter, Lisa Marie Presley.

5 . Jamey Turner often performs to large crowds in Old Town Alexandria, Virginia. You can find him playing an unusual musical instrument, the glass harp, near Alexandria's historic waterfront.

A glass harp is made up of different-sized drinking glasses, each filled with water. Turner makes music by running his fingers over the tops of the glasses. By doing so, each glass makes a different musical sound.

Turner is 78 years old now. He became interested in playing the glass harp at the age of six, when he heard his father playing with a glass of water at the dinner table. He has been playing it for 50 years.

Today Turner puts together his instrument by placing 60 different glasses on a wooden soundboard. He holds the glasses in place with rubber bands, which keeps them from breaking. He then adds different amounts of water to each one to create different musical notes. Adding or taking away just a little water will change the sound. Adding water to a glass will make a lower sound. The smaller bowls of water produce a higher sound, while the larger ones produce a lower, deeper sound.

Turner always uses low-priced glass because it sounds better than costly crystal and he has more control over the sound. Before buying new glasses, he will test them in stores.

The glass harp was popular 300 years ago when composers like Wolfgang Mozart wrote music for the instrument. There have been about 400 pieces of music written just for the glass harp. But Turner plays all kinds of music, even popular music from China. Few people play the glass harp these days, but Turner says he sees videos of people experimenting with the instrument on YouTube. He hopes the next generation will continue making their music.

6 . Loui Armstrong had two famous nicknames（绰号）. Some people called him Bagamo. They said his mouth looked like a large bag. Musicians often called him Pops, as a sign of respect for his influence on the world of music.

Born in 1901 in New Orleans, he grew up poor, but lived among great musicians. Jazz was invented in the city a few years before his birth. Armstrong often said, “Jazz and I grew up together.”

Armstrong showed a great talent for music when he was taught to play the cornet（短号）at a boy’s home. In his late teens, Armstrong began to live the life of a musician. He played in parades, clubs, and on the steamboats that traveled on the Mississippi River. At that time, New Orleans was famous for the new music of jazz and was home to many great musicians. Armstrong learned from the older musicians and soon became respected as their equal.

In 1922 he went to Chicago. There, the tale of Louis Armstrong began. From then until the end of his life, Armstrong was celebrated and loved wherever he went. Armstrong had no equal when it came to playing American popular songs.

His cornet playing had deep humanity and warmth that caused many listeners to say,” Listening to Pops just makes you feel good all over. “He was the father of the jazz style and also one of the best-known and most admired people in the world. His death, on July 6,1971, was headline news around the world.

7 . Robert Todd Duncan was born in 1903 in the southern city of Danville, Kentucky. His mother was his first music teacher. As a young man, he continued his music study in Indianapolis, Indiana.

In 1930, he completed musical education at Columbia University in New York City. Then he moved to Washington. For fifteen years, he taught music at Howard University in Washington. At that time, not many black musicians were known for writing or performing classical music. Teaching at Howard gave Duncan the chance to share his knowledge of classical European music with a mainly black student population. He taught special ways to present the music. These special ways became known as the Duncan Technique.

Besides teaching, Duncan sang in several operas with performers who were all black. But it seemed that he always would be known mainly as a concert artist. However, his life took a different turn in the middle of 1930s. At that time, the famous American music writer George Gershwin was looking for someone to play a leading part in his new work Porgy and Bess. A music critic (评论家) of The New York Times newspaper suggested Todd Duncan. Duncan had almost decided not to try for the part as he knew it would not be easy to get it. But he changed his mind. He sang a piece from an Italian opera to Gershwin. He had sung only for a few minutes when Gershwin offered him the part. He became famous because of the part in Porgy and Bess.

Todd Duncan gained fame as an opera singer and concert artist. But his greatest love in music was teaching. When he stopped teaching at Howard, he continued giving singing lessons in his Washington home until the week before his death.