Chuck Berry

Charles Edward Anderson Berry (born October 18, 1926), better known as Chuck Berry, is a highly influential American guitarist, singer and composer. Berry was born in St. Louis, Missouri and was part of the first group to be inducted into the new Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on its opening in 1986. He received Kennedy Center Honors in 2000.

Chuck Berry songs

Many of his songs are among the leading rock and roll anthems:

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• "Johnny B. Goode", the autobiographical saga of a country boy who could "play a guitar just like ringing a bell". It was chosen as one of the greatest achievements of humanity for the Voyager I collection of artifacts. The song was also prominently featured in the movie "Back to the Future."
• "Rock and Roll Music", one of the first tunes recorded by The Beatles
• "Sweet Little Sixteen", with new lyrics it became a hit for The Beach Boys as "Surfin' USA".
• "Roll Over Beethoven" (... tell Tchaikovsky the news), a cheeky announcement if ever there was one.
• "School Days", whose chorus, "Hail! Hail! Rock and Roll", was chosen as the title of a documentary concert film organized by Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones as his tribute to Chuck, who appears in the film with many others.
• "Let It Rock", fantasia of gambling railroad workers that lives up to the title, written under the pseudonym E. Anderson. Turning a line like "there's an off-schedule train coming two miles out" into a cry for Dionysian revelry is not a skill given to all singers.

His other hits, many of them novelty narratives, include:

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• "Maybelline" -- car, girl, rival, jealousy -- based on the country tune, "Ida Red", performed originally by Bob Wills & his Texas Playboys.
• "Too Much Monkey Business", teenaged attitudes, predecessor to rap, "Same thing every day, gettin' up, goin' to school, no need of me complaining, my objection's overruled". Also inspired the Bob Dylan song, "Subterranean Homesick Blues", Johnny Thunders' "Too Much Junky Business" play on title
• "Brown Eyed Handsome Man", adult attitudes, racism, "arrested on charges of unemployment"
• "Back in the U.S.A.", which inspired The Beatles' "Back in the USSR".
• "No Particular Place To Go" --car, girl, frustration
• "Memphis", unique beat, sweet story. Lonnie Mack and Johnny Rivers both built entire careers starting with this song.
• "My Ding-a-Ling", his only #1, a New Orleans novelty song that he had been singing for years and fortuitously included on a live recording in London in 1970.

Among his blues tributes:

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• "Confessing the Blues", signature tune of the famed Kansas City, Missouri jazz band of Jay McShann
• "Merry Christmas, Baby", originally by Charles Brown
• "Route 66", written by Bobby Troup, originally performed by Nat King Cole, but commonly associated with Berry.
• "Things I Used to Do", by Louisiana's Guitar Slim

His top Christmas song was:

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• "Run Rudolph Run"

See also:

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• The Great Twenty-Eight, Berry's definitive Greatest Hits album.