As the crew of Apollo 11 rocketed toward their historic moon landing on July 20, 1969, astronaut Buzz Aldrin listened to Jones' arrangement of Frank Sinatra's "Fly Me to the Moon."
In a phone interview from Marbella, Spain, Jones told AP Radio that when he heard the news from Sinatra, it was "like something that's surrealistic. You can't believe it."
Jones' connection to the space program doesn't stop there.
"The same time they were on the moon," the 76-year-old composer-conductor said Friday, "I was recording `Walking in Space,"' the CD that would earn Jones a Grammy for best jazz instrumental in 1970.
Astronaut Leland Melvin used "Walking in Space" as his wake-up music on the Atlantis space shuttle last year.
Jones said he would never follow his music into space.
"You couldn't pay me to go to the moon, man," he said. "I don't even drive a car."
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