Just Like a-Ringin' a Bell
By nature, I'm not a very spontaneous person. While I'm certainly not a "Type A" personality, I do like things to be organized and I like to have a "plan." There is a method to the madness: it prevents me from being indecisive and it keeps me from running in circles.
But now and then I do things off-the-cuff and those moments often result in great memories.
A perfect example: In early 1995 I had the opportunity to perform in Las Vegas in the orchestra of a local theater troupe. Long story short, the drummer of the orchestra had quit just a couple weeks before the scheduled performance in Vegas (at the Judy Bayley Theatre at UNLV) and I was asked if I'd be willing to assume the percussion duties on such short notice -- if so, my flight and accommodations would be taken care of. I was single at the time and had no reason to stay in one place, so I threw caution to the wind and hopped on the plane. Besides, I already knew the music!
But that's just part of the story...
After the troupe arrived in fabulous Las Vegas and checked in at the famous Aladdin (that's where Elvis got married), an advertisement caught my eye: Tonight! The Desert Inn Crystal Room Proudly Presents: Chuck Berry! Live in Concert!
I'm not sure if it was the opportunity to see a rock and roll luminary or just the fact that I had that Vegas buzz going (if you've been to Vegas, you know what I mean), but within a couple hours, there I was, seated in the famous Crystal Room, and just 90 feet away was the very stage where Frank Sinatra made his Las Vegas debut in 1951.
The Crystal Room was a classic Las Vegas showroom: seating about 700 people, complete with little candles on the tables, accented by red lampshades, black vinyl seats, and waiters flying around in tuxedos, like happy crows, making sure your beverage of choice was never empty. (God, I love Vegas!)
Soon the houselights dimmed, the band began to play and out stepped a familiar looking cat wearing a yellow western-styled sequin shirt, a bolo tie and that unmistakable wine-red Gibson ES-335 draped over his shoulder. I have to admit, I was star struck. There was Chuck Berry.
With a big smile (and very white teeth) he launched into the familiar rockin' riff of "Roll Over Beethoven," his set opener -- a song covered by every bar band in the world -- and it was that moment I began to grapple with a revelation: this guy... this guy right in front of me... wrote this song.
You see, that's the strange thing about Chuck Berry's music: it has always been there. It is in the ether. In the very air we breathe. It is played in shopping malls and supermarkets and dentist offices and elevators.
Everywhere there is electricity, you can hear Chuck Berry.
His show was basically the dictionary of rock and roll standards (and that is certainly not an overstatement): "Johnny B. Goode," "Sweet Little Sixteen," "Rock and Roll Music," "Memphis," "Maybellene," "Brown Eyed Handsome Man," "Carol," "School Days," "No Particular Place to Go," and the list goes on. He closed with "My Ding-a-Ling," which as incredible as it may seem, was his only #1 hit.
I do remember one funny moment during the show when a lady yelled out, "Play 'Little Queenie'!" just moments after he finished that very song. Berry looked her direction and said, "Ma'am, I just played that one. Waiter? Allow me to buy that woman another drink. Damn."
He played exactly 70 minutes, no more and no less. He didn't hang around for pictures or autographs when the show was over. There is no doubt he left the Crystal Room immediately afterwards, cash in hand, and drove away by himself in his Cadillac. That was the way he did business.
On March 18, 2017, the man who wrote all those songs, who stood just 90 feet away from me back in 1995, breathed his last.
I was listening to a conversation on the radio the other day discussing where Chuck Berry fits into the "architecture" of rock and roll. I thought it was an odd question because if it wasn't for Chuck Berry, there wouldn't be rock and roll.
If you think of rock and roll as a house, the great Louis Jordan cleared the land, then Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis laid the cornerstones. Everything else was built atop -- and no, I haven't forgotten Elvis Presley. In that house, Elvis was a big, beautiful mahogany door, allowing access to millions. But the door cannot stand, nor can it open, without the foundation.
Chuck Berry was the foundation.
When Berry started writing his own music, he didn't know he was creating a whole new genre. He said he was influenced by blues guitarist T-Bone Walker (who also inspired B.B. King to first pick up the guitar). Essentially, Berry wrote blues riffs to a shuffling rhythm, sketched in a catchy melody and stitched it all together with witty, poetic lyrics.
In fact, many have called Chuck Berry the "Poet Laureate of Rock and Roll."
A perfect example of Berry's lyrical charm and humor (with G-rated undertones of sexual frustration):
You were singing those lyrics to yourself, weren't you? That's the familiarity of Chuck Berry's music in us all (and it is, no doubt, the first and only time the word "calaboose" was ever used in a rock and roll song).
Every now and then I think back on that warm January evening in Las Vegas more than 20 years ago and smile. Getting out of the taxi in the Desert Inn parking lot. Thinking of all the stars who'd played that fabulous showroom, from Tony Bennett to Benny Goodman, from Jimmy Durante to Louis Prima... breathing that desert air and thinking to myself, "Man, I'm in Vegas! And Chuck Berry is in this building right now!"
Surreal.
I've never regretted that knee-jerk decision to see Chuck Berry. He was not just an icon. He was a pioneer. Words can't really do justice in describing his importance, not just in rock and roll, but in music as a whole. He truly was a once-in-a-lifetime artist.
And somewhere he's still playing that ES-335 just like a-ringin' a bell.
Go Johnny, go.
But now and then I do things off-the-cuff and those moments often result in great memories.
A perfect example: In early 1995 I had the opportunity to perform in Las Vegas in the orchestra of a local theater troupe. Long story short, the drummer of the orchestra had quit just a couple weeks before the scheduled performance in Vegas (at the Judy Bayley Theatre at UNLV) and I was asked if I'd be willing to assume the percussion duties on such short notice -- if so, my flight and accommodations would be taken care of. I was single at the time and had no reason to stay in one place, so I threw caution to the wind and hopped on the plane. Besides, I already knew the music!
But that's just part of the story...
After the troupe arrived in fabulous Las Vegas and checked in at the famous Aladdin (that's where Elvis got married), an advertisement caught my eye: Tonight! The Desert Inn Crystal Room Proudly Presents: Chuck Berry! Live in Concert!
I'm not sure if it was the opportunity to see a rock and roll luminary or just the fact that I had that Vegas buzz going (if you've been to Vegas, you know what I mean), but within a couple hours, there I was, seated in the famous Crystal Room, and just 90 feet away was the very stage where Frank Sinatra made his Las Vegas debut in 1951.
The Crystal Room was a classic Las Vegas showroom: seating about 700 people, complete with little candles on the tables, accented by red lampshades, black vinyl seats, and waiters flying around in tuxedos, like happy crows, making sure your beverage of choice was never empty. (God, I love Vegas!)
Soon the houselights dimmed, the band began to play and out stepped a familiar looking cat wearing a yellow western-styled sequin shirt, a bolo tie and that unmistakable wine-red Gibson ES-335 draped over his shoulder. I have to admit, I was star struck. There was Chuck Berry.
With a big smile (and very white teeth) he launched into the familiar rockin' riff of "Roll Over Beethoven," his set opener -- a song covered by every bar band in the world -- and it was that moment I began to grapple with a revelation: this guy... this guy right in front of me... wrote this song.
You see, that's the strange thing about Chuck Berry's music: it has always been there. It is in the ether. In the very air we breathe. It is played in shopping malls and supermarkets and dentist offices and elevators.
Everywhere there is electricity, you can hear Chuck Berry.
His show was basically the dictionary of rock and roll standards (and that is certainly not an overstatement): "Johnny B. Goode," "Sweet Little Sixteen," "Rock and Roll Music," "Memphis," "Maybellene," "Brown Eyed Handsome Man," "Carol," "School Days," "No Particular Place to Go," and the list goes on. He closed with "My Ding-a-Ling," which as incredible as it may seem, was his only #1 hit.
I do remember one funny moment during the show when a lady yelled out, "Play 'Little Queenie'!" just moments after he finished that very song. Berry looked her direction and said, "Ma'am, I just played that one. Waiter? Allow me to buy that woman another drink. Damn."
He played exactly 70 minutes, no more and no less. He didn't hang around for pictures or autographs when the show was over. There is no doubt he left the Crystal Room immediately afterwards, cash in hand, and drove away by himself in his Cadillac. That was the way he did business.
On March 18, 2017, the man who wrote all those songs, who stood just 90 feet away from me back in 1995, breathed his last.
I was listening to a conversation on the radio the other day discussing where Chuck Berry fits into the "architecture" of rock and roll. I thought it was an odd question because if it wasn't for Chuck Berry, there wouldn't be rock and roll.
If you think of rock and roll as a house, the great Louis Jordan cleared the land, then Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis laid the cornerstones. Everything else was built atop -- and no, I haven't forgotten Elvis Presley. In that house, Elvis was a big, beautiful mahogany door, allowing access to millions. But the door cannot stand, nor can it open, without the foundation.
Chuck Berry was the foundation.
When Berry started writing his own music, he didn't know he was creating a whole new genre. He said he was influenced by blues guitarist T-Bone Walker (who also inspired B.B. King to first pick up the guitar). Essentially, Berry wrote blues riffs to a shuffling rhythm, sketched in a catchy melody and stitched it all together with witty, poetic lyrics.
In fact, many have called Chuck Berry the "Poet Laureate of Rock and Roll."
A perfect example of Berry's lyrical charm and humor (with G-rated undertones of sexual frustration):
No particular place to go
So we parked way out on the Kokomo
The night was young and the moon was bold
So we decided to take a stroll
Can you imagine the way I felt?
I couldn't unfasten her safety belt!
Ridin' along in my calaboose
Still tryin' to get her belt loose
All the way home I held a grudge
But the safety belt, it wouldn't budge!
You were singing those lyrics to yourself, weren't you? That's the familiarity of Chuck Berry's music in us all (and it is, no doubt, the first and only time the word "calaboose" was ever used in a rock and roll song).
Every now and then I think back on that warm January evening in Las Vegas more than 20 years ago and smile. Getting out of the taxi in the Desert Inn parking lot. Thinking of all the stars who'd played that fabulous showroom, from Tony Bennett to Benny Goodman, from Jimmy Durante to Louis Prima... breathing that desert air and thinking to myself, "Man, I'm in Vegas! And Chuck Berry is in this building right now!"
Surreal.
I've never regretted that knee-jerk decision to see Chuck Berry. He was not just an icon. He was a pioneer. Words can't really do justice in describing his importance, not just in rock and roll, but in music as a whole. He truly was a once-in-a-lifetime artist.
And somewhere he's still playing that ES-335 just like a-ringin' a bell.
Go Johnny, go.
