This week's musicians birthdays include the genius/lecherous mediocrity (according to taste) Serge Gainsbourg, singing a duet with Brigitte Bardot, classic early 60s footage of Marvin Gaye, vibraphone maestro Red Norvo, Herb Alpert in a rodeo video doing “Casino Royale”, and Astrud Gilberto from Ipanema. Composer birthdays of the week are Franz Joseph Haydn and William Walton. Videos below.

Next month a concert celebrating the unique career of Humphrey Lyttelton, the great jazzer, broadcaster and quizmaster, will take place at HMV Apollo in Hammersmith, west London. The show, which takes place on 25 April, has been constructed about Lyttelton’s twin talents: blowing a trumpet and giving people silly things to do.

Now in its ninth year, London's East End Film Festival today announced its programme at a reception at the heart of its manor, at the Old Truman Brewery in Brick Lane. The Festival kicks off on 22 April with a preview screening of Barney Platts-Mills' cult 1969 film Bronco Bullfrog, set in Stratford, East London and starring local kids, prior to its re-release this summer.

The Sunday Times Oxford Literary Festival kicks off this week with a dazzling line-up of today's literary giants - including Martin Amis, Ian McEwan, Hilary Mantel, Rose Tremain, Tracey Chevalier, John Le Carré, Philip Pullman and Sebastian Faulks. Based in and around some of Oxford’s most jaw-dropping buildings, the festival runs from 20-28 March and offers more than 250 events including talks, topical panel discussions, a creative writing workshop and a newly re-launched children’s programme.

This week's birthdays include the impeccably funky Sly Stone and Wilson Pickett, manic Chopin played by the great pianist Sviatoslav Richter, lush orientalism from Rimsky-Korsakov, classic jazz from Bix Beiderbecke, and annoying pop from Clare Grogan.

Theatre lovers and theatre-history devotees alike will be delighted by the news that the Hackney Empire in east London, which went dark last month, is to be saved. A property developer will pay the theatre an unspecified sum to create 25 flats in an adjacent building it owns; there will also be offices and a community space for the use of the venue, a Grade II*-listed 1901 Frank Matcham beauty. The Empire's acting chief executive, Claire Middleton, described it as "a stabilising deal" and it will allow the theatre to regroup during 2010 before its next scheduled theatrical production, its enormously popular annual panto. A full 2011 season is expected to follow.

The announcement was made at the Barbican's launch of their 2010 season, which includes a tie-up with the Hackney Empire as part of their United in Swing programme. Wynton Marsalis will perform at the Empire on 20 June with the Jazz at the Lincoln Center Orchestra and tickets will go on sale through the Barbican shortly.