Wednesday, May 16, 2018

Did Someone Mention Jerry Lee Lewis?

Here he is on the Steve Allen show in 1957 - Steve mentions that he is about to head out to Racine Wisconsin, which I understand is somewhere up north. Then Jerry takes over and I can now see what my mistake was when it came to playing the piano - I was too restrained. Jerry was 22 when this was filmed, his star was shining as high in the firmament as it ever would, and as Deborah pointed out - his driving left hand plays 5ths and 6ths, no 7ths. I sometimes did that too, but I really liked 7ths, so I couldn't hang with the likes of Jerry Lee.



Jerry Lee Lewis is much younger than Frank Gehry, but as was the case with Tom Wolfe, guys of that era are getting up in years. Enjoy what they accomplished and know that we won't see their likes again.


Further perusal led me to this:


Jerry Lee at 53 - the tempo is slower but the energy remains over the top.

7 comments:

MamaM said...

On the astronaut theme, his music circled the world:

On the wall is a letter from astronaut Stuart Roosa, dated 25 May 1971. “Dear Mr Lewis, Our most heartfelt thank you for the tremendous tape you cut for me to take on Apollo 14. I can’t really describe how much it meant to me to have your music on board when we were 240,000 miles from home and the Earth had shrunk to a tiny ball.”

The Dude said...

Talk about a whole lot of shaking! That was one thing I liked about The Right Stuff movie - the camera work in the flying scenes, from Chuck Yeager through the astronauts ("Is that a crash helmet" Jose Jimenez "I hope not!") was spectacular. Those guys were truly amazing and that movie captured, as much as a movie can, what it must have been like riding in those machines. Spam in a can. Shaking like you were in a paint mixer. Impressive.

ricpic said...

Jerry had a thing for thirteen year old wives, among other great things about him.

Dad Bones said...

I think twelve was the minimum age for a young bride in Louisiana back then. That he was willing to wait until his cousin turned thirteen shows that his balls weren't always on fire and that he could be quite a considerate young man.

chickelit said...

Why no Frank Lloyd Wright tag? That’s the only reason people went to Johnson wax in those days.

XRay said...

Funny, Dad Bones.

The Dude said...

Steve Allen went to the corporate HQ because they were the sponsor of his show. He was all about the getting and the keeping of the money.

Is that building still standing?