Brooklyn Music Milestones – November 2011

Nov. 1-3, 2007: Backed alternately by an orchestra and a rock band, Kensington’s Sufjan Stevens performs The BQE at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House. Stevens was commissioned to compose the performance piece, a tribute to the famous (or infamous) highway, as part of BAM’s 25th Next Wave Festival.

Nov. 7, 1960: Save the Last Dance for Me, written by Williamsburg’s Doc Pomus and Brighton Beach’s Mort Shuman, begins its third week at number one. Today it ranks among the 25 most-performed songs of all time.

Nov. 19, 2009: New York magazine features a 12-page cover story on “Brooklyn’s Sonic Boom,” subtitled “How New York became America’s music capital again.” The article includes profiles of Grizzly Bear, Dirty Projectors and MGMT, plus a guide the Williamsburg music scene.

Dec. 2, 1978: The Barbra Streisand–Neil Diamond duet You Don’t Bring Me Flowers — written by two other Brooklyn music legends, Alan and Marilyn Bergman – zooms to the top of the charts. The original, created by a Louisville radio program director by splicing together the artists’ two individual versions, caught the attention of Columbia Records, which quickly urged its two top-selling artists to go into the studio and make it a true collaboration.

Dec. 13, 1928: George Gershwin’s musical composition “An American in Paris” is premiered by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

Dec. 29, 1982: Sheepshead Bay native Ken Dashow begins an 17-year run at progressive rock station WNEW-FM. When that station went to a talk format in 1999, he moved over to classic rock Q104.3 (WAXQ), where he can still be heard weekdays from 2-7 p.m.