OT: Chuck Berry, Musician Who Helped Define Rock ’N’ Roll, Dies at 90

[Tony T]

Chuck Berry, Musician Who Helped Define Rock ’N’ Roll, Dies at 90

Chuck Berry, who with his indelible guitar licks, brash self-confidence and memorable songs about cars, girls and wild dance parties did as much as anyone to define rock ’n’ roll’s potential and attitude in its early years, died on Saturday. He was 90.

The St. Charles County Police Department in Missouri confirmed his death on its Facebook page. The department said it responded to a medical emergency at a home and he was declared dead after lifesaving measures were unsuccessful.

While Elvis Presley was rock’s first pop star and teenage heartthrob, Mr. Berry was its master theorist and conceptual genius, the songwriter who understood what the kids wanted before they did themselves. With songs like “Johnny B. Goode” and “Roll Over Beethoven,” he gave his listeners more than they knew they were getting from jukebox entertainment.

His guitar lines wired the lean twang of country and the bite of the blues into phrases with both a streamlined trajectory and a long memory. And tucked into the lighthearted, telegraphic narratives that he sang with such clear enunciation was a sly defiance, upending convention to claim the pleasures of the moment.

In “Sweet Little Sixteen,” “You Can’t Catch Me” and other songs, Mr. Berry invented rock as a music of teenage wishes fulfilled and good times (even with cops in pursuit). In “Promised Land,” “Too Much Monkey Business” and “Brown Eyed Handsome Man,” he celebrated and satirized America’s opportunities and class tensions. His rock ’n’ roll was a music of joyful lusts, laughed-off tensions and gleefully shattered icons.

[verbs4us]

One way to honor Mr. Berry, with a joke I heard years ago.

In the early 1970s, when NASA shot Pioneer 10 and 11 into space, the space crafts contained a plaque depicting humans and the position of earth in the solar system. On board were several examples of daily life, including chewing gum, a newspaper, a baseball, some LPs and 45s and artwork by Michaelangelo. Years later, radio astronomers received a faint signal from beyond the solar system, at the fringe of our galaxy. They rushed to decode it, but the signal was so week it took them weeks to amplify it and begin translation. Finally, they pieced together the message, and held a massive press conference to announce our first contact with extraterrestrial life. Everyone wanted to know what the message was. "It's very simple," said Wernher von Braun, "It reads: 'Send more Chuck Berry.'"

[dave thompson]

My favorite artist, the Poet Laureate of rock'n 'roll.

[Vonruden]

Legend! Lived a nice long life.

[Peter P.]

Great portrait. Looks like a very humble guy.

[91Bear]

Originally Posted by verbs4us

One way to honor Mr. Berry, with a joke I heard years ago.

Just to make it a little more accurate:
In 1977, when NASA shot the Voyager satellites into space, they contained a plaque depicting humans and the position of earth in the solar system. Also on board was a golden record containing 116 images and a variety of natural sounds, such as those made by surf, wind, thunder and animals (including the songs of birds and whales). There were also musical selections , featuring artists such as Bach interpreted by Glenn Gould, Mozart, Beethoven, Stravinsky, Azerbaijani folk music by oboe player Kamil Jalilov, Guan Pinghu, Blind Willie Johnson, Chuck Berry, Kesarbai Kerkar and Valya Balkanska Years later, radio astronomers received a faint signal from beyond the solar system, at the fringe of our galaxy. They rushed to decode it, but the signal was so weak it took them weeks to amplify it and begin translation. Finally, they pieced together the message, and held a massive press conference to announce our first contact with extraterrestrial life. Everyone wanted to know what the message was. "It's very simple," said a NASA scientist, "It reads: 'Send more Chuck Berry.'"

[jlwdm]

I just listened to Johnny B. Goode by Peter Tosh. It is one of my favorite versions.

Jeff

[buldogge]

Chuck still played shows @ Blueberry Hill once a year, or so...always packed, of course. The room he played in is called the "Duck Room".

There has been a recent push to save his boyhood home in The Ville (once a proud working class black neighborhood, now very rough).

Here's a pic of fans starting to leave memorials near his statue, in The Delmar Loop, very near to Blueberry Hill and my shop.

There was actually a street band playing at the statue when folks got the news of Chuck's passing...they broke into a memorial song...there's some video out there, also by David Carson, the photog of this photo.

-Mark in St. Louis

[wpod]

RIP Chuck Berry. Thanks for helping open the eyes of a generation.

Misspelled from my HTC. One via TapaTalk

[93legendti]

I always loved this scene:

https://youtu.be/S1i5coU-0_Q

[Cicli]

A great artist.

[Bradford]

I loved Chuck Berry from the first time I heard him. Not only did my dad love him, but he is my six year old daughter's favorite musician also, right ahead of Beethoven. I would imagine that runs in a lot of families. I was out in the garage listening to him today before I read this news.

Very few musicians were as important as he was. Two of my favorite tributes to Chuck Berry from people who understand music much better than I do:



"If you tried to give rock and roll another name, you might call it ‘Chuck Berry'"

--John Lennon



"Well all Chuck's children are out there playing his licks
Get into your kicks
Come back baby
Rock 'n Roll never forgets"

--Bob Seger

[guido]

Sad news! He will be missed.

[Bob Ross]

I can't even begin to describe what a vast pervasive influence Chuck Berry had on me

...which is weird, because I suspect you would never hear it in my music...and, had he not just passed away, I would probably be extremely reluctant to give him that much credit. But when you're 11 years old, you are EXTREMELY impressionable.

[rounder]

Lots of great musicians have died and they will be missed.

Chuck berry was a great musician who will never be replaced.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ROwVrF0Ceg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9jKrHzps0XM