This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1988.

See Musical groups disestablished in 1988

The following songs achieved the highest chart positions in the charts of 1988.

The following singles achieved the highest chart positions in the U.S. of 1988.

Kim Williams was an American naturalist, writer, and the longest-ever running guest commenter on NPR where she was a guest commentator on the radio show All Things Considered for over ten and a half years.

Kim Williams was born on September 21, 1923 as Elizabeth Ardea Kandiko as the fourth child (of seven) as the daughter of Hungarian immigrants. She grew up on a farm in the Gallatin Township in New York and attended and graduated from Hudson High School and subsequently Cornell University where she graduated with a degree in human ecology with a minor in botany.

After her graduation she took jobs at various publications such as the Los Angeles Examiner and Flower Grower magazine, it was also at this time that she started writing poetry and short prose based on personal experience. In 1951, she met and married her husband Mel Williams and then moved to Santiago, Chile for twenty years. During her time in Chile, Williams wrote poems, plays, and short stories, she also wrote a newspaper column and taught English at the Catholic University of Chile. While in Chile she also and wrote and published her first two books, High Heels in the Andes and Wild Animals of Chile.

Joe Smooth is an American producer and DJ of house music, notably during the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Smooth was a self-taught musician, and started creating original music at the age of 12. In his teenage years, he began to make a name for himself as a DJ in the underground Chicago house music scene.

Smooth gained international acclaim with the release of his late 1980s tracks "Promised Land" (featuring Anthony Thomas), "They Want To Be Free" and "I Try". He is best known for "Promised Land", which spoke of how humans as brothers and sisters will all make it to the "Promised Land". It peaked at #56 in the UK Singles Chart in February 1989. An album became available in 1988, and a music video was produced for the single. A follow up album, Rejoice, was released in 1990, and contained the hit single "They Want To Be Free."

In October 2004, "Promised Land" appeared in the video game, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Within the game, the song could be heard playing on the fictional House Music radio station SF-UR.

Winona Ryder (born Winona Laura Horowitz; October 29, 1971) is an American actress. She made her film debut in the 1986 film Lucas. Ryder's first significant role came in Tim Burton's Beetlejuice (1988) as Lydia Deetz, a goth teenager, which won her critical and commercial recognition. After various appearances in film and television, Ryder continued her career with the cult film Heathers (1989), a controversial satire of teenage suicide and high school life, which drew Ryder further critical and commercial attention.

Having played diverse roles in many well-received films, Ryder won a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress and an Academy Award nomination in the same category for her role in The Age of Innocence in 1993, as well as another Academy Award nomination for Little Women the following year for Best Actress. In 2000, Ryder received a star on the Walk of Fame in Hollywood, California.

Ryder's personal life has been widely reported by the media. Her relationship with actor Johnny Depp in the early 1990s was highly publicized and received much scrutiny by the media and tabloid press. A much talked-about 2001 shoplifting incident led to a four-year hiatus from acting. She has also revealed her personal struggle with anxiety and depression, briefly checking into a clinic.