The song All American Boy told the story of how easy it was to become a rock-and-roll star. “Git ya a guitar and put it in tune, and you’ll be rockin’and a-rollin’ soon.” That line of lyrics reflects my opinion of most pop musicians. Chuck Berry once told me backstage after complimenting him on his creativity, “There’s nothing new under the sun” (a quote from Ecclesiastes in the Bible, I think). Learn the basic drum beat or a three chord guitar pattern and a few guitar riffs, make yourself look different, add a few innovative movements on stage, copy some pop music every musician already knew, add a couple of new licks, and you could have a hit if you knew the right people.

Of the hundreds of famous musicians I’ve met over the years, I would only brag about meeting a dozen of them. Most knew nothing about the fundamentals of music, couldn’t even read a musical score, couldn’t trace their own name and wouldn’t have enough sense to come in out of the rain unless it were to get high. There are exceptions from the 1950-70’s like McCartney, Stevie Wonder, Chuck Berry, Ray Charles, Fogerty, Willy Nelson, Bernstein, Ellington, Ernest Tubb, etc., who were very smart and talented.

But, I think the most overlooked is Kris Kristofferson. His melodies (that used some unusual notes for their time) and his lyrics are masterpieces. Sure, he’s probably best known for his hit Me and Bobby McGee, but just listen to the heartfelt lyrics of Help Me Make It Through The Night or Sunday Mornin’ Comin’ Down. Think about the words:  “There’s nothin’ short of dyin’ half as lonesome as the sound of a silent city sidewalk and Sunday mornin’ comin’ down” or “Come and lay down by my side ‘til the early mornin’ light cause’ I don’t want to be alone…help me make it through the night.” A little more poetic than “wop-bop-a-loo-mop-a-lop-bam-bam,” I would say!

Kris, whose parents didn’t approve of his musical career, was a college rugby star, graduated summa cum laude as a member of Phi Beta Kappa, then (like Bill Clinton) earned a Rhodes Scholarship to Oxford where he earned a Master’s Degree in English. He served his time in the military as a pilot in Viet Nam while most of the music crowd was avoiding the draft. He was even a professor at West Point. The list of Kristofferson’s songs is immense and the percentage that was covered by other artists is extraordinary.  He made a lot of musicians famous. He may not have been the best singer or movie actor, but he is a true American classic songwriter and citizen.

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The 1960’s began with Golden Rock-and-Roll and some big bands still doing well. I saw Duke Ellington once or twice a year and remember how his great tenor sax player, Paul Gonsalves, always knew me and let me stand three feet in front of him while he played (probably because I gave him a Camel cigarette between songs). I even spent a while talking with Cab Calloway one summer. I remember being invited to Bill (Count) Basie’s house in Connecticut for a weekend (as a result of being friendly with his nephew). What a thrill! My brother got a dirty look from Lionel Hampton for trying to imitate his antics while we were standing less than six feet from his vibraphone. I spent an hour, one-on-one, with Carl Perkins (of “Blue Suede Shoes” fame) before a concert. I was part-time stage manager at an auditorium where Dave Brubeck told me he was the only Jewish rancher left in California. In the same job, as a prank during a concert, I dropped a home-made stink bomb into the Boston Symphony’s cello section. I met many of the great Country musicians at the Bushnell Auditorium in Hartford where I stood next to Ernest Tubb when, during the break, he let a blind girl come back-stage and read a poem she had written for him. I met the Kingston Trio when they performed at my university’s student union, met Peter-Paul-and-Mary in Hampton Beach, met the Platters’ Herb Reed back-stage when my brother played with them, spent a long time with Glen Campbell in his dressing room (thanks to his drummer being my brother’s good friend), had dinner (at my parents’ house) with Gladys Knight’s guitar player, listened to Dave Van Ronk (the great, white blues singer) up close and personal in a Boston coffee-house, and so on. The point is: all the musicians I met during the 1960’s represented different music genres.

After the British Invasion in 1963, popular music moved in many directions. By the mid-60’s, audiences were applauding The Who’s guitarist, Pete Townshend, smashing his instruments on stage. By the end of the decade, Janice Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison all died from drug overdoses. When you think about the stars of the 60’s, they would have to include everyone from the Beatles (British rock) to Temptations (Motown) to Ray Stevens (humor) to John Fogerty (swamp-rock) to Marty Robbins (country-crossover) to The Beach Boys (clean-cut rock) to Bob Dylan (protest poetry) to Ray Charles (gospel-R&B-country crossover) to Loretta Lynn (pure country) to Miles Davis (free jazz) to The Mamas & The Papas (folk-rock). I could go on and on. The music of the 1960’s was as diverse, and sometimes as radical, as the country’s racial and political views.

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Consider the pioneers of rock like Jerry Lee Lewis, Bill Haley, and Elvis; then realize almost all their songs were written by others; and none of these guys were great instrumentalists (even Jerry Lee’s piano skills are greatly exaggerated, considering I could play better boogie-woogie piano in my teens). Who composed rock songs that had meaningful poetry for lyrics, wrote songs with chord patterns that were an enhancement over 100-year-old blues, had a vocal style as good as the best black or white singers, invented simple but catchy (now classic), unique guitar riffs for each song, and can still enthrall an audience with a 2-3 hour non-stop concert? My only answer is, John Fogerty.

Including his days beginning with Credence Clearwater Revival through his current solo days, his first real big hit was a cover of Dale Hawkins’ “Susie Q” that John didn’t write. But, the innovative drum beat and vocal style (both much different than Hawkins’) made the Fogerty/ Credence version a bigger hit than the original.

Fogerty was not a star during the era that I define as “old-time rock and roll.” His songs were written in the late 1960’s and thereafter. But, the music itself was far closer to the genre of the 1950’s than any decade since then. “Green River,” “Proud Mary,” and “Travelin’ Band” are examples. Then, there are all the songs that don’t belong to any rock decade but will be rock classics forever, like “Centerfield,” “ Bad Moon Rising’” “Lookin’ Out My Backdoor.” “Fortunate Son” and “Down on the Corner.” Every one of his songs has a unique beat, unique lead guitar (played by Fogerty) theme, and lyrics that have meaning. For example, when you listen to “Green River” can’t you just envision the cool water running by the log where catfish bite, or walking along a river road at night, or seeing barefoot girls dancing in the moonlight, or hearing the bullfrog, or seeing kids swinging over the river on a rope, or listening to the “advice” of railroad campers? Give Fogerty a lot of credit. He made listeners feel like they were in the Mississippi Delta with his lyrics and technique, even though Fogerty was from California. His poetry, vocal style, guitar licks, and drum-beats were innovative; that’s why he’s an all-time great.

Every time I hear him in concert, he comes on stage and says something like, “ Thanks for being here….I’m not much for making speeches….I’m about rock and roll….so, let’s get with it!” Then, even in his sixties, he’ll rock for 2 or 3 hours straight. Don’t miss him!

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Around sixty years ago, the electric bass and the amplifier were invented by Leo Fender.  About that time, Les Paul invented the electrified guitar. He also came up with the idea of an echo machine that led to an amplifier “reverb,” both very important in the early days of rock-and roll. Originally, the echo machine was a tape recorder that had both a recording pickup (head) and one or more playing heads. The guitar was plugged into one end of the machine and the amp into the other end; and each note would be recorded by one head and then played back again, one or more times, at a selected tape speed. The reverb (now electronic) originally was a spring (between two mechanical pickups) that could vibrate much faster and produce many more echoes than a tape recorder/player.

When I think of “The Greatest,” regarding any vocalist or instrumentalist, I think of innovation even more than technical expertise. Certainly, Chuck Berry was innovative with his two-string harmony solos, but even he admitted they were variations of older jazz piano licks learned from his pianist Johnnie Johnson (which is probably why Berry’s songs were recorded in keys like B-flat and E-flat, rather than the easier-to-play guitar keys of E and A). Carl Perkins, Joe Maphis, Danny Cedrone and Scotty Moore were among other great, innovative guitar players who helped shape the music of the 1950’s.

But, the picker that had the greatest influence on the popularity of Rock-and-Roll was Louisiana’s James Burton, lead guitar player for Ricky Nelson and Elvis (after Scotty Moore and up until The King’s death). Also, being an accomplished musician, he recorded albums with Bobby Darin, Everly Brothers, Jerry Lee Lewis and many others, including famous Country singers (John Denver for many years) with whom he often played the slide Dobro guitar.  He was one of the first to employ the echo machine like he had heard Scotty Moore use when the latter was playing guitar for Elvis in the Sun Records days. Then, he cranked up the amplifier and created licks that blew people away. I recommended going to YouTube.com and playing Ricky Nelson’s “Believe What You Say” or “Hello Mary Lou”) to see James Burton in his early days on the Ozzie And Harriet show.  Bruce Springsteen, Keith Richards and John Fogerty say the only reason they watched that TV show as kids in the 50’s was to watch James Burton play. Me too!

Burton was one the first to use light gauge strings so he could bend notes and also hit higher-than-normal pitches. He used a normal flat pick but added a pick to his middle finger so he could pick banjo style, then would dampen the lower strings with his pick-hand like Chet Atkins, except he would play new, creative, awesome-sounding licks that became rock-and-roll classics.  He contributed as much to rock-and-roll music as anyone.

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Their unique sound stems from the fact that they used a tight harmony, meaning the harmony note was close (on the musical scale) to the melody note. This harmony was so tight, that when I watched the Everlys perform, I couldn’t tell which brother was singing the melody note and which was singing the harmony note. Oddly, I contend that both notes combined represented the melody in many of their songs. Not only was their intonation perfect, so was their timing. In other words, the two singers sounded as one; and the quality of their voices was beautifully mellow, like my Steinway grand piano.

The final technical fact is regarding their guitars. They began by using big, thick, non-electrified Gibson guitars. Musicians call this type of flat-top, hollow-body monster a Dreadnought, a name originally coined by Martin Guitar Company after the HMS Dreadnought, the deadly British battleship built prior to World War I. Don and Phil sometimes used an “open-tuning” for their instruments, meaning some strings are tuned down to form a chord, (D-G-D-G-B-D), and may have used a banjo string (like high-G, as their father Ike did) to get a greater-than-normal two-octave chord range (thus, producing a full-sounding, very “open chord”). All this resulted in a powerful sound. Notice how Don frequently started a song with a series of highly rhythmic, big-sounding chords that would catch the listeners’ attention and hook them in to listening to the rest of the song. Think of the intros to “Bye Bye Love,” “Wake-up Little Suzie,” or “Bird Dog.”

I could recite much of the Everly family’s biography from the Kentucky coal mines to the years of moving from state-to-state singing for local radio stations before Don and Phil, on their own, hit the big-time in Nashville. I will detail only the most important fact. After taking their recording of Boudleaux and Felice Bryant’s “Bye Bye Love” to several labels and getting turned down (even by Columbia), Chet Atkins discovered Don and Phil and got them onto the Cadence label that had been formed by Archie Bleyer originally to record Julius LaRosa (of TV’s Arthur Godfrey Show). Who played lead guitar on the Everly Brothers’ early recordings? Believe it or not, Chet Atkins did.

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I define “old-time rock and roll” as encompassing the period of 1955 to 1963 that mostly utilized two basic chord patterns. The first was the normal 12-bar blues pattern that may have originated in the cotton fields: I/ I/ I/ I/ IV/ IV/ I/ I/ V/ IV/ I/ I/. (Musicians use Roman numerals to denote chord patterns and “/” to denote the end of a bar or measure). The numeral stands for the root note of the chord based on a do-re-mi scale. In the key of C for example, the above blues pattern would mean that “I” represent a C-chord, “IV” would represent an F chord and “V” would be a G (or usually a G7 chord). Another very popular chord-pattern of the late 1950s was the doo-wop sound that had a simple 2-measure pattern repeated over and over: /I-I-VI-VI/ IV-IV-V-V/. So, in the key of C, the chords would be /C-C-A(minor)-A(minor)/ F-F-G-G/. Hundreds of songs in the 50s used this simple pattern (think “Sh-boom” or “Blue Moon”).

Old time rock and roll had a unique rhythm, too. Previously, pop music had a “bounce” to the beat that was very distinguishable. Think of a drummer’s right hand on the ride-cymbal going “ching-a-ching-a-ching-a-ching-a” over a 4-beat measure. The “ching” usually lasted twice as long as the “a” in every beat (representing a 67% bounce or swing). Sometimes, such as in certain jazz pieces, the “ching” would last 3 times as long as the “a,” representing a 75% bounce or swing. Then, musicians like Little Richard and Chuck Berry came along and the bounce became barely noticeable, maybe using only a 55% bounce (think “Johnny B. Goode” or “Long Tall Sally”) or a 60% bounce (think “Whole Lotta Shakin”). That’s what gave rock and roll the “drive,” (i.e. the almost-steady beat of the eighth-notes) making the teens go crazy and running to the closet to grab their boppin’ shoes. Today’s young drummers have a hard time emulating this beat.

In 1963, the Beatles’ music came to America. It wasn’t their mop-heads or Cockney, adenoid accents that made the biggest difference. It was the change in chord patterns and rhythm. No blues or doo-wop patterns; but instead, chords that would be more like those in folk music (which had its origins in the British Isles centuries ago). Even the chord-changes of their first international hits like “I Want To Hold Your Hand” and “She Loves You,” despite the very simple (almost meaningless) lyrics, had chord progressions that were more like patterns of Celtic folk melodies than a Little Richard song.

Importantly, rhythm was something the Beatles concentrated on, particularly when they selected their second drummer, Richard Starkey (Ringo). The “bounce” was minimal, no more than 55%; think “ching-ching-ching-ching” on the ride cymbal or hi-hat.

Within a few years, Beatles’ lyrics had become much more sophisticated, as had the chord patterns. McCartney’s “Yesterday” (1965) and “Hey Jude” (1968) are genuine pieces of art. The basic chord pattern of “Yesterday” is F, E(minor), A, D(minor) or I-VII-III-VI. In “Hey Jude,” the unusual chord pattern of the coda (repeated 7 times at the end, to the lyrics “na-na-na-nananana-nananana-hey Jude”) is F, E-flat, B-flat, F. Nothing the rock-a-billy cats ever wrote sounded anything like that!

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Joe listened to what my needs and desires were for a guitar; an instrument with a rich, warm sound that also had “bite”, good sustain when needed and a guitar that could “sing”. The primary use of this guitar would be for jazz and rhythm & blues. He brought several blocks of wood for me to look at and he educated me on the qualities of each type of wood regarding sound.We settled on the materials and he reviewed the type of neck and action that I sought. He went through my existing guitars, took measurements and asked me how I would like to improve the action and feel. Joe wanted to create the “ideal” neck for me.

The guitar was completed in 2000 and it has replaced all of my other guitars for both live performance and studio work. It is exactly what I had been looking for and far exceeded my expectations. The quality of sound is impeccable and the reliability of the instrument is flawless in every aspect; the intonation is absolutely perfect and consistent in every position. The guitar has a rich, warm sound with the “bite” that I had heard in my mind for many years. This guitar absolutely “sings”.

I highly recommend Dragony Guitars to any artist looking for the best quality instrument available for live performance as well as studio work. The workmanship is second to none and the Dragony Guitar is an absolute work of art. For any musician that has a “stable” of guitars, be advised that once you invest in and acquire a Dragony Guitar you probably will retire all of your other instruments. It’s simply that good!

Joe Dragony is very much an artist and incorporates the highest standards of quality, reliability and beauty in his instruments. He does not let a guitar leave his shop unless it is a model of perfection. I recommend his guitars without reservation.”

Visit Dragony Guitars here.

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But, of all the top-selling performers of the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, which one was really the most musically talented? Who could sing rock and roll, jazz, folk, commercial pop, and country music as well as anyone? Who could play guitar, play drums as well as Gene Krupa, play awesome boogie-woogie and R&B piano, play vibes, play harmonica (and sing at the same time), write much of his own music (including several classics) and vocalize as well as all the legends of his time? Who co-starred in many well-known movies, including those for which he wrote the sound track? Who could side-shuffle his feet across the stage like James Brown and gyrate like Tom Jones? Who had an IQ approaching Einstein’s?

I’m talking about the man who was born in 1936 and died in 1973 following a heart-valve operation at age 37, whose real name was Walden Cassotto from Bronx NY, who never knew his father and grew up believing the story that his older sister was his mother. From “Splish Splash” in 1958, to “Dream Lover” in 1959, to “Mack-the-Knife, Beyond the Sea, Clementine, and Lazy River” in 1960, he was the man who outsold Sinatra at the Copacabana and was the youngest performer to ever headline at a major Las Vegas casino.  The greatest all-around musician and most versatile entertainer of the early days of rock and roll was Bobby Darin.

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Also, I  don’t count doo-wop music as classic rock and roll (with its totally different chord pattern and rhythm). With very few exceptions, if the music doesn’t have the classic rock and roll, driving beat and blues chord pattern, it won’t make my list. After the Beatles started selling their music in the U.S. in 1963, rock and roll was never the same (even though the Beatles early hits were great stuff, the chord patterns and rhythm were totally different). The only real rock and roll man after 1963 was John Fogerty, in my opinion.

So here’s my list of Dave Hammer’s top 50 rock and roll songs of all time (strictly based on my memory and knowledge of music, without checking any historic billboards) encompassing 1955 to 1963, by artist (but in no particular order). Many of these songs are covers from earlier artists and some were covered by later artists, but I picked my favorite versions:

Little Richard (5)- Tutti Frutti, Long Tall Sally, Heebie Jeebies, Good Golly Miss Molly, Rip It Up

Bill Haley (2)- Rock Around the Clock, Shake Rattle and Roll

Carl Perkins (2)- Blue Suede Shoes, Matchbox

Elvis (5)- Mystery Train, That’s All Right, Heartbreak Hotel, Good Rockin’, Jailhouse Rock

Gene Vincent (1)- Be-bop-a-lula

Buddy Knox (1)- Party Doll

Buddy Holly (2)- Peggy Sue, That’ll Be the Day

J.P. (Big Bopper) Richardson (1)- Chantilly Lace

Wanda Jackson (1)- Hard-headed Woman

Duane Eddy (1)- Rebel Rouser

Ventures (1)- Walk Don’t Run

Santo and Johnny (1)- Sleepwalk

Rick Nelson (2)- Mighty Good, It’s Late

Fats Domino (3)- Blueberry Hill, I’m Walkin’, Blue Monday

Jerry Lee Lewis (3)- Whole Lotta Shakin’, Great Balls of Fire, I’m On Fire

Ray Charles (1)- What’d I Say

Bobby Bare (a.k.a. Bill Parsons) (1)- All American Boy

Ritchie Valens (1)- La Bamba

Chuck Berry (5)- Johnny B. Goode, School Day, Roll Over Beethoven, Reelin’ and Rocking, Sweet Little Sixteen

Everly Brothers (3)- Bye Bye Love, Bird Dog, All I Have To Do Is Dream

Coasters (1)- Yakety Yak

Bobby Darin (1)- Splish Splash

Isley Brothers (1)- Shout

Frankie Ford (1)- Sea Cruise

Danny and the Juniors (1)- At the Hop

Lloyd Price (1)- Lawdy Miss Clawdy

Dale Hawkins (1)- Susie Q

Bobby Day (1)- Rockin’ Robin

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