Born Charles Edward Anderson Berry on October 18, 1926, in St. Louis, Missouri, Chuck Berry did more than almost anyone to invent rock and roll as its own sound and attitude. He fused country guitar licks with rhythm and blues, turning the guitar riff into the song's central hook on hits like "Maybellene," "Roll Over Beethoven," and "Johnny B. Goode," the last becoming the only rock and roll song included on the Voyager Golden Record sent into space. Onstage he popularized the duck walk, a move he'd first done as a kid crouching to retrieve a dropped ball, turned into a signature trick generations of guitarists tried to copy. His playing and showmanship directly shaped the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Jimi Hendrix, among countless others. Berry was one of the first artists inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame when it opened in 1986.

Born on October 18, 1946, Joe Egan co-founded Stealers Wheel in 1972 in Paisley, Scotland, with his childhood friend Gerry Rafferty, singing lead and backing vocals while playing keyboards and rhythm guitar. The pair co-wrote "Stuck in the Middle with You," the band's biggest hit, which reached No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1973 and sold over a million copies. The song found a second life nearly two decades later when Quentin Tarantino used it in Reservoir Dogs for the film's infamous torture scene, cementing it as one of cinema's most unsettling music cues. Growing tension between Egan and Rafferty eventually led the band to break up in 1975, though they briefly reunited in 2008. Egan went on to release solo albums, including 1979's Out of Nowhere, before his death in 2024.

Born on October 18, 1949, in Peoria, Illinois, Gary Richrath spent nearly two decades as REO Speedwagon's lead guitarist and primary songwriter, joining in 1970 and staying through 1989. He wrote and performed on staples like "Ridin' the Storm Out" and "Son of a Poor Man," sang lead on "Dance" and "Breakaway," and co-wrote the band's biggest hit, "Take It on the Run." In 1977 Richrath and his bandmates took over production duties themselves, a shift that helped drive the band toward its first platinum album. He left the group in 1989 but returned once more in 2013 for the "Rock to the Rescue" benefit concert in Bloomington, Illinois, closing the set with "Ridin' the Storm Out" before joining Styx and Richard Marx onstage for the encore.