http://www.yahoo.com/headlines/current/news/stories/rock.html (Einblicke ins Internet, 10/1995)
CLEVELAND (Reuter) - The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame opens to the public Saturday with a concert featuring artists from five decades of popular music.
The six-hour concert at Cleveland Stadium next door to the museum features dozens of rock legends including Chuck Berry, Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young and Aretha Franklin.
The museum was inaugurated Friday, with the ghosts of Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon close by.
Hendrix's version of the national anthem opened the ceremony dedicating the structure on the shores of Lake Erie where speakers said the spirit of rock 'n' roll will be enshrined forever more.
And Beatle John Lennon's widow Yoko Ono told a crowd of several thousand she was glad she had found a place to put John's stuff.
``As a member of the rock 'n' roll community, I'm very glad we now have a home,'' Ono said. ``John would have liked the fact that he's now here and not anymore in my closet.''
Crowds lined downtown Cleveland streets to see papier mache icons from rock's five decades of history parade past on their way to the ceremony at the hall designed by noted architect I.M.Pei, 10 years and $92 million in the making.
Speakers peppered their speeches with references to songs from rock's golden era in the 1960s and 1970s.
``Hail, hail rock 'n' roll!'' declared Jann Wenner, editor and publisher of Rolling Stone magazine and a prime mover in making the Rock Hall a reality.
``As Huey Lewis said, 'The heart of rock 'n' roll is beating in Cleveland','' said Ohio Gov. George Voinovich. ``It's been a long and winding road.''
Hall of fame director Dennis Barrie, whose past accomplishments include a First Amendment battle over a photo exhibit that some said was pornographic, rose to speak to the strains of ``I Fought the Law and the Law Won''.
Cleveland's claim to rock 'n' roll fame is based partly on the fact that pioneer disc jockey Alan Freed started a rock radio show here widely seen as having helped spark the century's biggest musical revolution.
The 150,000-square-foot museum is a cantilevered glass and steel pyramid reminiscent of a number of other I.M. Pei structures, which include the glass pyramid in the Louvre and the Bank of China building in Hong Kong. It houses what Barrie calls one of the greatest collections on the history of rock 'n' roll.