Today's Birthdays

one click shows all of today's celebrity birthdays

Browse All Birthdays

43,625    Actors
27,931    Actresses
4,867    Composers
7,058    Directors
842    Footballers
221    Racing drivers
925    Singers
9,111    Writers

Get FamousLikeMe on your website
One line of code gets FamousLikeMe on your website. Find out more.

Subscribe to Daily updates


Add to Google

privacy policy



Famous Like Me > Singer > V > Ritchie Valens

Profile of Ritchie Valens on Famous Like Me

 
Name: Ritchie Valens  
   
Also Know As:
   
Date of Birth: 13th May 1941
   
Place of Birth: Los Angeles, California, USA
   
Profession: Singer
 
 
From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia
Ritchie Valens

Richard Steven Valenzuela (May 13, 1941–February 3, 1959), better known as Ritchie Valens, was a pioneer of rock and roll and, as a Mexican-American born in Los Angeles, California, became the first Mexican American rock and roll star.

Valens' hits included "Come On, Let's Go", "Donna", and "La Bamba"; the latter became the title of a 1987 movie about his life (see La Bamba), which introduced Lou Diamond Phillips as Ritchie and co-starred Esai Morales as his older half-brother Bob Morales.

Valens was a pioneer of Chicano rock and influenced the likes of Chris Montez and Carlos Santana.

In early 1959, Valens was traveling the Midwest on a multi-act rock and roll tour. In the early morning following a February 2nd performance at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, a small four-passenger Beechcraft Bonanza aircraft departed into a blinding snowstorm and crashed into Albert Juhl's cornfield several miles after takeoff at 1:05 a.m. The crash killed Valens, along with co-performers Buddy Holly, J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, and the pilot Roger Peterson. This event inspired singer Don McLean's popular 1971 ballad "American Pie", and immortalized February 3rd as "The Day The Music Died".

Ritchie Valens is interred in the San Fernando Mission Cemetery in Mission Hills, California. He has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6733 Hollywood Blvd. in Hollywood, California, and he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001.

Tribute

Monument at Crash Site, September 16, 2003

In 1988, Ken Paquette, a Wisconsin fan of the 50s era, erected a stainless steel monument depicting a steel guitar and a set of three records bearing the names of each of the three performers. It is located on private farmland, about one quarter mile west of the intersection of 315th Street and Gull Avenue, approximately eight miles north of Clear Lake. He also created a similar stainless steel monument to the three musicians near the Riverside Ballroom in Green Bay, Wisconsin. That memorial was unveiled on July 17, 2003.

Sample

  • Download sample of "La Bamba"

External link

  • La Bamba at the Internet Movie Database

This content from Wikipedia is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Ritchie Valens