Birthday: Sam Cooke

Soul singer Sam Cooke would have celebrated his 78th birthday today.

Cooke was born Sam Cook (without the e, which he later added) on Jan. 22, 1931 in Clarksdale, Miss. His father was a Baptist minister, and Cooke began singing gospel music with his siblings at an early age. He later became a member of gospel group The Soul Stirrers, and successfully crossed over to pop music (much to the chagrin of those in the gospel music world) in 1956.

Cooke's first secular release was "You Send Me," a B-side, which stayed at #1 on Billboard's R&B chart for six weeks. He later had hits with songs like "Chain Gang," "Bring It On Home To Me" and "Another Saturday Night" (one of my all-time favourite songs). You can hear some of Cooke's biggest hits below.

At the end of Cooke's career, he had 29 Top 40 hits — and that was just on the pop charts; he had more hits on the R&B charts. Cooke would also release four studio albums during his career.

Cooke's life was tragically cut short when he was shot to death on Dec. 11, 1964 at Los Angeles' Hacienda Motel.

There is quite a bit of debate surrounding the cause of his death and what exactly happened. Cooke's death was ruled a justifiable homicide because the motel's manager, Bertha Franklin, claimed Cooke had burst into the manager's office wearing only a trench coat and a shoe, demanding to know where a woman had gone.

Franklin claims she said she did not know, and Cooke violently grabbed her. After fighting on the floor, Franklin fatally shot Cooke in the stomach.

A woman later claimed Cooke had taken her back to his hotel room and tried to rape her. She ran away, and he showed up at Franklin's office in a rage. Another story says the woman tried to rob Cooke, made off with his money and he'd been trying to find it at the time of his death.

Some of Cooke's family members, however, claim there was a long-standing conspiracy to murder him. Singer Etta James claimed that Cooke's injuries were too serious to have been caused by one person, and she thinks Cooke was beaten by a group of people before he died.

"A Change Is Gonna Come," which may be Cooke's best-known single, was released posthumously. It later became an anthem of the civil rights movement, and has influenced everyone from Malcolm X to Barack Obama.

"A Change Is Gonna Come":

 

"Another Saturday Night":

 

"This Little Light Of Mine":