Hi, everyone. Welcome to this week’s edition of Music Monday.
(Image found online. Original source unknown.)
Yesterday marked the 100th birth anniversary of the Father Of Rock & Roll. Charles Edward Anderson Berry, professionally known as Chuck Berry, was born October 18, 1926 in St. Louis, Missouri. He showed an affinity for music early on and gave his first performance when he was still in school. After he finished a three year jail sentence for armed robbery in 1947, Berry got married a year later and settled into a domesticated existance.
But by 1953, music called his name again. An encounter with Muddy Waters led to a meeting with Leonard Chess, the founder of Chess Records. In 1955, Berry’s first single was released. A year later he released “Roll Over Beethoven”, in May 1956, marking this year as its 70th anniversary. And next year will mark the 70th anniversary of his debut album, After School Session, released in May 1957.
When Berry passed away in March 2017, I shared in a post that “when the Beatles came to America on February 7, 1964 and performed on “The Ed Sullivan Show” two days later, it changed the world. When the Beatles performed their first concert in the United States later that same year – in Washington, DC – their opening song was “Roll Over Beethoven” because Chuck Berry changed their world”.
On Day 45 I shared the timeline of how Berry’s contribution started rock & roll:
“If I had to pinpoint how rock & roll music officially began, my timeline would be this:
1908: The year American bandleader & swing/big band/R&B musician Louis Jordan is born.
1916: The year American rockabilly songwriter Claude Demetrius is born.
1926: The year American guitarist Charles Edward Anderson Berry is born. The world would come to know him as Chuck Berry. Soon he learns to “play a guitar just like a-ringin’ a bell and, oh my, that little country boy could play”.
1946: Demetrius writes a song (co-written with Jordan’s wife, Fleecie Moore) called “Ain’t That Just Like A Woman” which Jordan records and turns into an R&B hit the same year.
1958: Berry writes and records his semi-autobiographical groundbreaking hit, “Johnny B. Goode”. The song begins with a note for note replica of the introduction to Jordan’s 1946 song, written by Demetrius. A new sound is born from combining music from the swing/big band/R&B/rockabilly genres and Berry is christened “The Father of Rock & Roll”.
Young impressionable youths like John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Jimi Hendrix and many others are entranced by what Berry does with a guitar. Fast forward to 1963 & 1964 where The Beatles record Berry covers “Roll Over Beethoven” & “Rock & Roll Music” and stop by America for that Sunday night show at the same theatre David Letterman was in and there you have it.
Yes, Elvis (who covered a few of Berry’s songs), Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, Carl Perkins and many other early architects of this new sound were coming up around the same time as Berry. However, his musicianship, his stage dance moves (most notably the “duck walk”) and his songwriting talent made him a triple threat and set him apart from the others. Elvis will always be the King, but Berry was and remains The Master.
“Johnny B. Goode” also has the distinction of being part of NASA’s Voyager Space Mission as one of the pieces of music from Earth. And honestly, can you imagine Marty McFly sliding across the floor to any other song in “Back To The Future”?”
Charles Edward Anderson Berry: October 18, 1926 – March 18, 2017.
Chuck Berry circa 1957. (Image found online. Original source unknown.)
Berry at the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame concert in Cleveland, Ohio in September 1995. (Image found online. Original source unknown.)
Berry (center) at his Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame ceromony in NewYork City in 1986 with Ahmet Ertegun (L), co-founder of Atlantic Records and Keith Richards (R) of The Rolling Stones. Photo from Chuck Berry’s Facebook page. (Image found online. Original source unknown.)
Chuck Berry: “Maybellene” (1955, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “Roll Over Beethoven” (1956, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “Rock & Roll Music” (1957, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “Johnny B. Goode” (1958, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “Back in the USA” (1959, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “No Particular Place to Go” (1964, written by Chuck Berry).
Chuck Berry: “You Never Can Tell” (1964, written by Chuck Berry).
Stay safe & well.
