| Little Richard | |
|---|---|
Little Richard performing in Austin, Texas, in March 2007 |
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Richard Wayne Penniman |
| Also known as | Little Richard |
| Born | December 5, 1932 |
| Origin | Macon, Georgia, U.S. |
| Genres | Rock and roll, rhythm and blues, soul, gospel |
| Occupations | Musician, songwriter, recording artist, actor |
| Instruments | Vocals, piano, keyboards. saxophone |
| Years active | 1945[1]–present |
| Labels | RCA Camden, Peacock, Specialty, Gone, Atlantic, Bell, Brunswick, Coral, Critique, Elektra, End, Guest Star, Kent, Lost-Nite, Mainstream, Manticore, MCA, Mercury, Modern, Vee Jay, Okeh, Reprise, K-Tel, Black Label, Warner Bros., WTG |
Richard Wayne Penniman (born December 5, 1932), known by the stage name Little Richard, is an American singer, songwriter, musician, recording artist, and actor, considered key in the transition from rhythm and blues to rock and roll in the 1950s. He was also the first artist to put the funk in the rock and roll beat[2][3] and contributed significantly to the development of soul music.[4] The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame website entry on Penniman states that:
He claims to be "the architect of rock and roll", and history would seem to bear out Little Richard’s boast. More than any other performer – save, perhaps, Elvis Presley, Little Richard blew the lid off the Fifties, laying the foundation for rock and roll with his explosive music and charismatic persona. On record, he made spine-tingling rock and roll. His frantically charged piano playing and raspy, shouted vocals on such classics as "Tutti Frutti", "Long Tall Sally" and "Good Golly, Miss Molly" defined the dynamic sound of rock and roll.[5]
Penniman began performing on stage and on the road in 1945, when he was in his early teens.[1] He began his recording career on October 16, 1951[6] by imitating the gospel-influenced style of late-1940s jump blues artist Billy Wright,[7] who was a friend and also helped arrange his first sessions. These early recordings did not achieve much commercial success. However, in 1955, under the guidance of Robert "Bumps" Blackwell, Penniman began recording in a style he had been performing onstage for years,[8] featuring varied rhythm (derived from everything from drum beats he would hear in his voice to the sounds of trains he would hear thundering by him as a child), a heavy backbeat, funky saxophone grooves, over-the-top gospel-style singing, moans, screams, and other emotive inflections, accompanied by a combination of boogie-woogie and rhythm and blues music.[1] This new music,[9] which included an original injection of funk into the rock and roll beat,[3][5] inspired many of the greatest recording artists of the twentieth century, including James Brown,[10] Elvis Presley,[11] Otis Redding,[4] Bob Dylan,[12] Jimi Hendrix,[4][13] Michael Jackson,[14] and generations of other rhythm & blues, rock, and soul music artists.[15]
On October 12, 1957, while at the height of stardom, Penniman abruptly quit rock and roll music and became a born-again Christian.[16] He had charted seventeen original hits in less than three years.[17] In January 1958, he enrolled in and attended Bible college[18] to become a preacher and evangelist and began recording and performing only gospel music for a number of years. He then moved back and forth from rock and roll to the ministry, until he was able to reconcile the two roles in later life.[19]
Penniman was among the first group of inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986 and one of only four of those artists (along with Ray Charles, James Brown, and Fats Domino) to also receive the Rhythm and Blues Foundation's Pioneer Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2003, Penniman was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.[20] In 2007, his 1955 original hit "Tutti Frutti" was voted Number 1 by an eclectic panel of renowned recording artists on Mojo's The Top 100 Records That Changed The World, hailing the recording as "the sound of the birth of rock and roll."[21][22] In 2010, The United States of America's Library of Congress National Recording Registry added the groundbreaking recording to its registry, claiming that the hit, with its original “A-wop-bop-a-loo-bop-a-lop-bam-boom!” a cappella introduction, heralded a new era in music.[23]
Richard Wayne Penniman was born in Macon, Georgia, the third of 12 children born to Charlie "Bud" Penniman, Sr. (10 April 1910 – 12 January 1952[24]), a bootlegger[25] and his wife Leva Mae (née Stewart). He grew up in a religious family in which singing was an integral part of their lives; they performed in local churches as The Penniman Singers, and entered contests with other singing families. His family called him "War Hawk" because of his loud, screaming singing voice. His grandfather, Walter Penniman, was a preacher, and his father's family were members of the Foundation Templar African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church in Macon. His maternal grandmother was a member of Macon's Holiness Temple Baptist Church. Penniman attended the New Hope Baptist Church in Macon, where his mother was a member. Penniman's favorites were the Pentecostal churches because of the music and the fun he would have doing the holy dance and speaking in tongues with members of the congregation. When he was 10, he became a faith healer, singing gospel songs and touching people, who would testify that they felt better afterwards. Inspired by Brother Joe May, a singing evangelist known as "The Thunderbolt of the West", Penniman wanted to become a preacher.[26]
Almost all of Penniman's dramatic phrasing and swift vocal turns are derived from black gospel artists of the 1930s and '40s. He said Sister Rosetta Tharpe was his favorite singer when he was a child. She had invited him to sing a song with her onstage at the Macon City Auditorium in 1945, after hearing him sing before the concert. The crowd cheered, and she paid him more money than he had ever seen after the show.[27] He was also influenced by Marion Williams, from whom he got the trademark "whoooo" in his vocal, Mahalia Jackson and Brother Joe May.[28] He was influenced in appearance (hair, clothing, shoes, makeup, etc.) and sound by late 1940s gospel-style, jump blues shouter Billy Wright, a friend of his who was known as the "Prince of the Blues".[29] Wright set Penniman up with DJ Zenas Sears, who scored the newcomer his first recording contract in 1951.[30] One of Penniman's main influences in piano-playing was Esquerita (Eskew Reeder, Jr.), who showed him how to play high notes without compromising bass. Penniman met Esquerita when he traveled through Macon with a preacher named Sister Rosa.
Penniman lived in a black neighborhood; he had some contact with whites but, due to racial segregation, he could not cross the line where the whites lived.[31] While in high school, Penniman played alto saxophone in the marching band. He began losing interest in school and began performing in a variety of travelling shows in his mid-teens.[24]
In October 1951, Penniman began recording jump blues records for RCA Camden. His father was shot to death while he was recording in a studio on January 12, 1952.[24] In October 1953, he began recording with Peacock Records.[32] Records were released each year during 1951–54, but none were significant hits.
Following two recording sessions with Peacock in 1953,[33] Penniman, dissatisfied with his solo career, began to form a new R&B road band that he called "The Upsetters." The band began with New Orleans drummer Charles "Chuck" Connors and two saxophonists, including Wilbert "Lee Diamond" Smith.[34] By 1955, the band was joined by saxophonists Clifford "Gene" Burks and Grady Gaines, who became its leader,[35] along with Olsie "Baysee" Robinson on bass, and Nathaniel "Buster" Douglas on guitar.[36]
At Lloyd Price's suggestion, Penniman recorded a demo for gospel/R&B label Specialty Records on February 9, 1955.[37] Specialty's owner, Art Rupe, loaned him money to buy out his contract from Peacock Records and placed his career in the hands of Specialty's A&R man Robert "Bumps" Blackwell.[38]
Rupe and Blackwell originally pictured Penniman as a commercial rival to Ray Charles, who was experiencing success with Atlantic Records by taking gospel songs and developing them in a bluesy setting with a beat.[39] Penniman told Rupe he liked Fats Domino's sound, so Rupe and Blackwell booked Cosimo Matassa's J & M Recording Studio in New Orleans,[40] and hired studio musicians who had worked with Domino (including Earl Palmer on drums and Lee Allen on sax) rather than members of Penniman's road band on many[33][41] of the mid-1950s Specialty tracks.[42]
Following some recordings that did not satisfy Blackwell, they took a break. Penniman began pounding out a boogie woogie rhythm on piano and hollering out impromptu recital of "Tutti Frutti", a song he had written and had been performing on stage for years. Blackwell was so impressed with the sound that he had Penniman record the song. However, in order to make it commercially acceptable, Penniman's lyrics were rewritten. Blackwell recognized that the lyrics, with their “minstrel modes and homosexuality humor” needed to be cleaned up.[43] For example “Tutti Frutti, good booty",[44] were replaced with “Tutti Frutti, aw-rooty”. The song featured the a cappella intro "A-wop-bop-a-loo-lop-a-lop-bam-boom!", which Penniman first belted out years before onstage based on a drum beat he heard in his voice, that had also been altered slightly to make it commercially acceptable.[45] The recording was released on Specialty in October 1955.[1][46]
"Tutti Frutti" reached #2 on Billboard's R&B chart. Seventeen more hit singles followed in less than three years, three of which reached number 1.[17] While most of these hits were characterized by a driving piano, boogie-woogie bass line, a variety of rhythmic drumbeats, and wild screams before Lee Allen's sax solos, such as "Rip It Up", "Lucille", "Jenny, Jenny", "Good Golly, Miss Molly" and "Keep A-Knockin'", a few of them were slower in tempo and more soulful, such as "True Fine Mama".[17] During this period, he also appeared performing his hit songs in three films, including The Girl Can't Help It (1956), in which he sang the hit title track, Don't Knock the Rock (1956), and Mister Rock and Roll (1957).
"Tutti Frutti" was quickly covered by both Elvis Presley and Pat Boone.[47] While Presley's versions only appeared as album tracks, Boone's covers were released as singles and his "Tutti Frutti" single outsold the source record[48] and "outdid Richard's on the hit parade".[49] Boone also released a version of "Long Tall Sally"[48] with slightly bowdlerized lyrics, but this time, the original version outperformed the cover on the Billboard pop chart.[49] Presley and Bill Haley tackled Penniman's fourth R&B chart topper, "Rip It Up", but his single was the hit.
Penniman, along with his road band, performed his hits in sports stadiums and concert venues across the United States through 1956 and 1957.[50] He brought the races together at his concerts, at a time in the United States when laws still dictated that public facilities (including concert venues) be divided into separate "white" and "colored" domains. His audiences would start out segregated in the building, usually with one race on the floor and the other on the balcony, but most of the time, by the end of the night they were mixed together.[51] Racists in the south, such as the North Alabama White Citizens Council, responded by putting out statements on television, warning the public that "Rock n Roll is part of a test to undermine the morals of the youth of our nation. It is sexualistic, unmoralistic and ... brings people of both races together."[52] The demand for him was so great, however, that even in the south where segregation was most rampant, the taboos against black artists appearing in white venues were being shattered.[53]
Penniman was an innovative and charismatic performer, appearing in sequined capes under flicker lights that he brought from show business into the music world. He would run off and on the stage, jumping, yelling, and whipping the audience into a frenzy.[54] At a concert in Baltimore, Maryland, US concert history was made[55] when excited people had to be restrained from jumping off the balconies, and the police had to stop the show twice to remove dozens of girls that had climbed onstage to try to rip souvenirs from Penniman. Later in the show, girls began to throw their undergarments onto the stage.[55]
While on the road in the mid-50s, Penniman would have notorious parties,[56] replete with orgies, in hotel rooms wherever they appeared. In late 1956, he met a voluptuous high school graduate in Savannah, Georgia, by the name of Lee Angel (née Audrey Robinson). She became his girlfriend and started traveling on the road with him. Penniman would invite attractive men to his parties and would enjoy watching them having sex with his girlfriend.[57]
In early October 1957, on the fifth date of a two-week tour of Australia, Penniman was flying from Melbourne to appear in front of 40,000 fans in concert in Sydney. Shocked by the red hot appearance of the engines against the night sky, he envisioned angels holding up the plane. Then, while he performed at the stadium, he was shaken by the sight of a ball of fire that he watched streak across the sky overhead. He took what was actually the launching of Sputnik 1, the first human-made object to orbit the earth, as another sign to quit show business and follow God. The following day he departed Sydney on a ferry and threw his $8,000 ring in the water to show his band members that he was serious about quitting. The plane that he was originally scheduled to fly back home on ended up crashing in the Pacific Ocean, which he took as confirmation that he was doing what God wanted him to do.[58]
The news of his quitting at the height of his career had broken all over the world by the time he returned to the United States.[59] He attended one more recording session for Specialty on October 18, 1957,[60] and, at the request of DJ Alan Freed, performed a farewell concert at the Apollo Theatre in New York. He then had his roadies drive his Cadillacs across the United States to a property he bought for his mother in California and gave her the keys.[61] He formed the Little Richard Evangelistic Team, travelling across the country preaching, and helped people locally through a ministry on skid row in Los Angeles.[62]
From October 1957 to 1962, Penniman recorded gospel music for End, Mercury, and Atlantic Records.[63] In 1958,[64] he enrolled in the Seventh-day Adventist[5][18] Oakwood College (now Oakwood University), in Huntsville, Alabama, where he planned to take a three-year course which was to culminate in ordination.[65] In November 1957, he met Ernestine Campbell at an evangelistic meeting in Washington, D.C..[65] They were married on July 11, 1959.[66]
Following release of his gospel album for Mercury Records titled The King of the Gospel Singers, Little Richard met Mahalia Jackson, one of his childhood heroes. She was appearing in Los Angeles and he stopped her on the street to invite her to hear him sing at the Mount Maria Baptist Church. She attended and indicated that she was delighted with his singing, stating that "he was singing gospel songs the way they should be sung" and "he had that primitive beat and sound that came so naturally."[67] Three of his gospel songs during this period hit the pop charts - "He's Not Just a Soldier" (1961) and "He Got What He Wanted" 1962 (UK) for Mercury Records, and "Crying In The Chapel" (1963) for Atlantic Records.[68] He continued in the ministry but was experiencing marital problems and some difficulty living his ideal of a disciplined Christian life.[69]
Although rock and roll sales were in a slump in America in 1962, Penniman's records were still selling well in England. From April to May of that year, The Beatles, then still an obscure band, co-resided with Penniman at the Star Club in Hamburg, Germany, during which time he advised them on the proper technique for performing his songs.[70] Included in this instruction was teaching Paul McCartney his "woo holler."[71] British promoter Don Arden then booked Penniman for an October 1962 tour of Great Britain, with the Beatles as an opening act.[72] Penniman thought he was going to perform gospel music, but Arden had promoted the concert as a rock and roll show. On the first night of the tour he began performing gospel music, but gave in to the pressure and began performing his secular hits. He walked off to a standing ovation. The frenzied crowd reaction was to be repeated wherever he appeared.[73]
He returned to Specialty Records in March 1964, recording one secular track, following a Don Arden headlining deal, accepted by Penniman, who decided not to disclose his reactivated Rock and Roll activity to the church community because he was convinced that rock and roll was evil and still wanted to keep his options open in the ministry.[74]
He had successfully toured England and Wales in October and November 1963,[50] with Bo Diddley, The Everly Brothers and the then little-known Rolling Stones.[75][76] Mick Jagger would later state, "I heard so much about the audience reaction, I thought there must be some exaggeration. But it was all true. He drove the whole house into a complete frenzy... I couldn't believe the power of Little Richard onstage. He was amazing."[77] Near the end of the tour, Penniman recorded a television show, The Little Richard Spectacular, with Sounds Incorporated as the backing band and The Shirelles performing backing vocals, for Britain's largest independent television company at the time, Granada. After the show was first aired in May 1964, Granada received over 60,000 letters from fans, which prompted the company to two repeat broadcasts of the show. Much of the footage was used for a TV special, highlighting the frenzy and excitement associated with rock and roll, that was seen all over the world.[78]
Penniman recorded four more secular tracks for Specialty in April 1964.[79] One of these recordings, "Bama Lama, Bama Loo" was released as a single and was a minor hit on the Billboard charts but a Top Twenty in the UK.
Around January 1965 he brought a fledgling Jimi Hendrix (who wanted to be known at the time as 'Maurice James') into his band, full-time.[5][80] Hendrix began dressing and growing a mustache like Penniman's.[81] He toured with Penniman and played on at least a dozen tracks for Vee Jay Records between the spring of 1964 and spring of 1965.[82] Of these, "I Don't Know What You Got But It's Got Me" and covers of "Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On" and "Goodnight, Irene" hit the pop and/or R&B charts with moderate success.[83]
Penniman continued to record and perform only secular music in the mid-60s, during which time he began drinking heavily.[80] He has stated that he could have had more commercial success during this period, but southern preachers displeased with his backslide from the ministry pressured R&B radio stations throughout the southern U.S. not to play his music, while on the West Coast, particularly in Los Angeles following the Watts Riots, some black DJs were not playing his music because he was drawing both races to his concerts.[84]
In 1966 and 1967, Penniman recorded two soul albums for Okeh Records, with his old friend from the mid-'50s, Larry Williams, as producer, and Johnny Guitar Watson on guitar.[85] The first album included two modest hits, "Poor Dog" and "Commandments Of Love"[86] In August 1967, the second album, which was an "Okeh Club" concert performance, returned Penniman to Billboard's Top 200 Albums chart for the first time in 10 years,[2] and reached the Billboard Black Albums Top 30. Williams also acted as the musical director for Penniman's live performances used for the album, and Penniman's bookings during this period skyrocketed.[86]
With the emergence of the Black Power movement in the latter part of the decade, Penniman was invited to perform for strictly black crowds. He refused because he did not want to exclude any races from attending his shows.[87] He remained a popular concert attraction, travelling extensively in the United States and Europe, as well as in Mexico and Canada, throughout the remainder of the decade.[50]
In 1969, he was invited to perform at the Toronto Rock and Roll Revival. The event was filmed by director D.A. Pennebaker and also featured Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, Jerry Lee Lewis and Gene Vincent.[88][89]
Penniman continued to tour, appear in an occasional film, and record secular music into the 1970s. The Rock and Roll Revival period of the late sixties resulted in another comeback opportunity for Penniman in the early seventies. However, instead of recording only the expected high-energy rock & roll, he recorded a series of eclectic, wide-ranging albums that touched on country, acoustic blues, hard-driving funk, soul, gospel, melodic pop, as well as rock & roll. The range and accomplishment of the music, which included stunning covers of recordings by artists that he inspired as well as powerful, memorable new songs written by Penniman himself, was staggering.[90] These albums resulted in two Top 100 hits for Reprise Records between 1970 and 1972. In '72 he had a short stay on the charts as guest on Canned Heat's "Rockin' With The King". The following year, Richard did fairly well with the soul ballad, "In The Middle Of The Night", profits to go to charity, and a single charted briefly for Manticore in 1975.[91] That same year, he played piano on the Top 40 single "Take It Like a Man" from the Bachman–Turner Overdrive hit album Head On and recorded a gospel song entitled, "Try To Help Your Brother". In 1976, he re-recorded twenty of his biggest Specialty hits in Nashville for a K-Tel Records album.[92]
Penniman also continued his wild partying through the first half of the seventies[93] and, reportedly, by late 1971, developed a dependency on a variety of drugs and alcohol.[94] He and his brothers started their own management company, Bud Hole Incorporated.[95]
In 1977, Penniman reached a crossroad in his life. Two close friends, a brother and a nephew that he loved as a son, died, and he came close to being shot by his long-time friend, Larry Williams, over a drug debt. Even though he and Williams were very close friends, cocaine addiction fueled a rage in Williams when Penniman failed to repay him because he was high. In what he referred to as the most fearful moment of his life, Penniman happened to have the money and Williams spared him.[96]
Penniman repented for his wayward living and returned to evangelism.[2] He also represented Memorial Bibles International and sold their Black Heritage Bible, which highlighted the many black people in the Bible.[2] In 1979, he recorded a gospel album entitled God's Beautiful City,[2] and embarked upon an evangelical campaign across the U.S.[97] During this period, he proclaimed that it was not possible to perform rock and roll music and serve God at the same time.[98]
Penniman evangelized to crowds of as few as 250 in small churches to packed auditoriums of 21,000 through the remainder of the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s. His preaching focused on bringing the races together and lost souls to repentance through God's love, as well as the rejection of his former lifestyle of alcoholism, drug addiction and bisexuality.[99][100]
In 1984, Charles White's authorized biography of Penniman (The Life and Times of Little Richard) was published, featuring extensive first-person input from its subject, testimonials of Penniman's influence on many legendary recording artists, and attracting attention for its "juicy anecdotes".[101] The publication catapulted Penniman into the limelight again with a number of the world's largest newspapers and magazine's featuring major reviews.
Shortly before the publication of the biography, Penniman's mother died. Not long before she died he promised her that he would remain a Christian. He thereafter reconciled his role as an evangelist and as a rock and roll artist, stating that he believed that rock and roll music could be used for good or evil.[19]
In an effort to merge his faith with his music, Penniman enrolled his old friend Billy Preston to help him write a song with religious lyrics that sounded like rock and roll. The song was destined for the soundtrack of a new motion picture entitled Down and Out in Beverly Hills. The result was "Great Gosh A'Mighty (It's a Matter of Time)", which became a hit. The hit theme song appeared in a different version on an album of faith-based material entitled Lifetime Friend, recorded (primarily in England) from late 1985 into early 1986. Penniman referred to his new style of music as "message music" and "messages in rhythm",[102][103] which included a track that was an innovative blend of rap and funky rock music. Penniman also acted in the hit motion picture and received critical acclaim for his performance.[19]
Near the end of the recording process for Lifetime Friend, Penniman flew back to the United States to appear in an episode of the television show Miami Vice. Following the filming he broke his leg in an automobile accident,[104] which prevented him from attending the first Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony on January 23, 1986, at which he was honored as one of the first inductees.[2]
In 1987, Penniman recorded a track for the 1988 tribute album Folkways: A Vision Shared ("The Rock Island Line", backed by Fishbone).[105] He also recorded the theme song for the Twins motion picture soundtrack with Philip Bailey and appeared in a promotional music video of the recording for the movie with Bailey, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny DeVito.
The pressure to return to singing his classic secular hits seemed to mount as the spotlight on Penniman continued. On November 11, 1988,[106] Penniman was filmed as he appeared at "The Legends of Rock and Roll Concert" in Rome, Italy, along with Jerry Lee Lewis, Bo Diddley, Fats Domino, B.B. King, Ray Charles, and James Brown.[107][108] Penniman sang three songs; two faith-based ("Great Gosh a'Mighty" and "Joy, Joy, Joy") and the third family-themed ("No Place Like Home"). While others sang the lyrics of one of his secular hits ("Tutti Frutti"), introduced by Jerry Lee Lewis during the all-star jam session finale involving all of the artists, Penniman refused to sing the lyric, instead passing the microphone to Bo Diddley, who seemed to support him by changing the song. However, at an AIDS benefit concert hosted by Cher in March 1989, Penniman performed his classic, "Lucille" for the first time in 13 years. This event marked Penniman's second return to performing his classic brand of rock 'n' roll, though not to the hedonistic lifestyle he had ventured after his first return to secular music in the sixties.
Penniman would go on to continue to perform some of his faith-based brand of rock 'n' roll music at his concerts, as well. In April 1989, he preached, rapped in funky rhyme style, and sang background vocals on the live, extended version of the 1989 U2/B.B. King hit "When Love Comes to Town".[109] He also recorded on a gospel music track with John P. Kee.
Penniman remained active throughout the 1990s on television, in music videos, commercials, movies, in concert and as a guest recording artist.[110] In 1990, he recorded a rap segment for Living Colour's "Elvis Is Dead" (featuring Maceo Parker on saxophone) and then performed it with the band live on television.[111][112][113] He appeared in "Mother Goose Rock N Rhyme" (as Ol' King Cole) in 1990. He appeared (as a preacher) in music videos for Cinderella's "Shelter Me" and in a new recording of "Good Golly Miss Molly" for the motion picture King Ralph (1991).[110][114] He recorded an album of classic children's songs in his original rocking style for Disney, as well as the opening theme song for the science mystery cartoon The Magic School Bus. He has also voiced an animated version of himself in an episode of Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventures. He recorded duets with Jon Bon Jovi, Hank Williams, Jr., Elton John, Tanya Tucker and Solomon Burke on his Definition of Soul album. He also recorded new tracks for two motion picture soundtracks: Casper (1995) and Why Do Fools Fall in Love (1998).
Penniman appeared (as himself) in Why Do Fools Fall in Love, as well as in the 1999 film Mystery, Alaska, in which he sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" and "O Canada". He also guest starred as himself in television shows including Columbo (in an episode entitled "The Murder of a Rock Star"),[115] Full House (in the episode entitled "Too Little Richard Too Late"), Muppets Tonight (in an episode full of cameo appearances), Martin (in the episode entitled "Three Men and a Mouse")[110] and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air.[110] On June 2, 1995, he appeared on the ABC daytime soap opera One Life to Live.[116] He portrayed a fictionalized version of himself, officiating the wedding of supercouple Bo Buchanan and Nora Gannon,[117] who were huge fans of 1950s rock and roll music.
In the summer of 1998 he toured Europe with Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis.
In 2000, Robert Townsend directed a television biopic entitled Little Richard about the artist's life from childhood to his early 30s (circa 1962). Leon Robinson received an Emmy Award nomination for his performance in the starring role.[118]
Penniman's continued to record, tour, and appear on television throughout the decade.[50][110] He wrote and recorded a song for the 2001 film The Trumpet of the Swan. In 2002, he recorded a rocking version of Johnny Cash's "Get Rhythm" for Kindred Spirits: A Tribute to Johnny Cash. In 2005, he and Jerry Lee Lewis recorded a duet of the Beatles' hit "I Saw Her Standing There" for Lewis' 2006 album Last Man Standing. In 2006, he was featured in a hit Geico television advertisement.[119] Later that year, he was retained by Simon Cowell to be a judge in the Fox television series Celebrity Duets.[120] On March 24, 2007, Penniman performed and lectured students at the University of Texas event "40 Acres Fest", featuring 1,200 bands.[121][122][123] He also performed that year at the Capitol Fourth, a July 4 celebration in front of the White House. On July 25, 2007, he made an appearance on the ABC show The Next Best Thing.[124] On November 22, 2007, he headlined the half-time show for a Thanksgiving football game at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Arizona.[125] In 2007, to help raise funds to benefit sick and dying children, as well as to debunk the notion that Don Imus was a racist, he recorded a guest track for The Imus Ranch Record (2008).[126] In June 2008, Penniman also made a cameo appearance on The Young and the Restless as an ordained piano-playing minister.[127]
Reverend Richard Penniman, who had performed wedding ceremonies for celebrities including Cyndi Lauper, Bruce Willis and Demi Moore, Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen, Steve van Zandt and Michael Jackson's former lawyer John Branca (for whom Jackson was best man),[128] spoke a message with a heavy spiritual emphasis at his old friend Wilson Pickett's January 2006 funeral,[129] officiated at a wedding of 20 couples in December 2006,[130] and preached at Ike Turner's December 2007 funeral.[131] On May 30, 2009, following a performance in honor of Fats Domino to raise funds to help rebuild children's playgrounds devastated by Hurricane Katrina, Penniman led Domino and others present in prayer.[132][133] On June 12, 2009, prior to performing for the grand finale of 29th annual Riverbend Music Festival in Chattanooga, Tennessee[134] he said, "although I sing rock 'n' roll, God still loves me. I'm a rock 'n' roll singer, but I'm still a Christian."[135] In late November 2009, Penniman asked for fans to pray for his quick and full recovery from a recent surgery on a hip, which had been causing him pain in his left leg for some time.[136]
Little Richard continued to recover from the operation on his left hip in the first part of 2010. On June 5–6, 2010, he spent time at The Rock House in Franklin, Tennessee to record a new track — a cover of Dottie Rambo's "He Ain't Never Done Me Nothing But Good", as part of a star-studded tribute to the late gospel songwriting legend which is slated for release in 2011.
In January 2011, Penniman appeared for an interview on the set of Charles Wright's "Express Yourself Show." Interviewed by Mr. Duran, Penniman preached a brief messsage to his Latino fans, spoke of his ongoing recovery from the operation on his hip, and introduced his rap recording artist nephew, RR112, who performed a partial rhyme at the end of the interview.[137] Penniman performed at "A Capital Fourth" celebration in Washington, D.C. on July 4, 2011. His performance included several of his most well known hits, including Long Tall Sally and Good Golly Miss Molly.[138]
Born the third of twelve siblings, Penniman was raised in a family with deep evangelical Christian roots. He was put out of the home by his father, who told him that he had spoiled his wish to have seven sons because of his sexual mannerisms. After Penniman began making records, his father had started to open up to him. But his father was fatally shot by Penniman's best friend, James LeRoy, outside a local bar. At the time Penniman was 19 years old.[1]
Penniman became actively involved in orgies in the mid-1950s. In June 1956, Penniman met what has been described as his life-long soul mate, a young woman by the name of Audrey Robinson, who also went by the name Lee Angel. Robinson, who was 16 years of age when they first met, had graduated from high school early and was a college student at the time.[1] Penniman converted to Christianity in October 1957, and met Ernestine Campbell at an evangelical church rally. They were wed in 1959. Penniman had some difficulty living a disciplined Christian life and was drawn so much to show business that he ended up divorcing his wife in 1963. The marriage did not produce any children. However, Penniman did adopt the son of a deceased church associate in the early 1960s.[1]
Penniman's sexuality has been a long topic of debate with the singer himself admitting that he had homosexual experiences as a young adult but later in life after becoming born again, he told a biographer that homosexuality was "contagious". In the same breath, he announced to the same biographer that he was "omnisexual" and in an interview with Penthouse magazine in 1995, said that he knew he was homosexual.[1] Richard has had affairs with both men and women in the past.
Following over a decade of wild living, Penniman encountered a series of devastating personal experiences, including a near fatal, drug-fueled clash with his long-time friend Larry Williams in 1977. He returned to evangelical ministry and walked away again from rock and roll music, stating that it was not possible to serve God and perform that style of music at the same time. Prior to the death of his mother in 1984, Penniman promised her that he would remain a Christian. He proceeded to use rock and roll to produce gospel recordings that he referred to as "messages in rhythm," changing his stance by stating that rock and roll could be used for good or evil.
Penniman has remained single for many years, is deeply spiritual, and now lives in Moore County Tennessee . In recent years, he has occasionally been in the company of his former girlfriend from the mid-1950s, Audrey Robinson.[139][140]
Penniman's influence on the development of a variety of major musical genres in the twentieth century and many of those genres most significant artists was immense.[141] James Brown, who called Penniman his idol,[10] stated that Penniman was the first to put the funk in the rock and roll beat via his mid-1950s road band.[2][3] Otis Redding, who entered the music business because of Penniman, indicated that Penniman contributed significantly to the development of soul music.[4] Richie Unterberger of allmusic.com stated that "Little Richard merged the fire of gospel with New Orleans R&B, pounding the piano and wailing with gleeful abandon. While numerous other R&B greats of the early '50s had been moving in a similar direction, none of them matched the sheer electricity of Richard's vocals. With his bullet-speed deliveries, ecstatic trills, and the overjoyed force of personality in his singing, he was crucial in upping the voltage from high-powered R&B into the similar, yet different, guise of rock & roll. Although he was only a hitmaker for a couple of years or so, his influence upon both the soul and British Invasion stars of the 1960s was vast, and his early hits remain core classics of the rock repertoire."[142]
Penniman has been recognized for his outstanding musical contributions by many other high-profile artists. In November 1988, Ray Charles introduced him at the Legends of Rock n Roll concert in Rome, as "a man that started a kind of music that set the pace for a lot of what's happening today."[9] Bo Diddley stated that "Little Richard was a one-of-a-kind show business genius. He influenced so many people in the business."[143] Paul McCartney said that he idolized Penniman when he was in school and always wanted to sing like him,[144] and Mick Jagger called Penniman "the originator" and "my first idol."[145] Bob Dylan performed Little Richard songs on piano as a schoolboy in his first band and declared in his high school yearbook in 1959 that his ambition was "to join Little Richard",[12][13] and in 1966, Jimi Hendrix, who recorded and performed with Penniman from 1964 to 1965."[143] and began to emulate him in appearance, like Prince (mustache, clothing, etc.) during that time,[143] was quoted as saying, "I want to do with my guitar what Little Richard does with his voice."[146] Cliff Richard,[147] George Harrison,[148][149] Keith Richards,[150][151] Bob Seger,[152] John Fogerty,[153][154] David Bowie,[155] Elton John,[84] Freddie Mercury,[156][157] Rod Stewart,[158] and AC/DC band members Bon Scott,[159] Angus Young,[160] and Brian Johnson[161][162] are among the many other top-selling recording artists of the twentieth century who indicated that Penniman was a first and/or primary rock 'n' roll influence. In 1979, as he began to develop his solo career, Michael Jackson was quoted as saying that Penniman was a huge influence on him.[163]
A lot of songs I sang to crowds first to watch their reaction. That's how I knew they'd hit.[172]