Recently, someone posted a delightful photo of Chuck Berry and Pete Townshend from the June 7, 1993, groundbreaking for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on a social media group dedicated to nostalgia and historical photography related to Cleveland.
The commentary began with someone noting that it was cool that “The King of Rock & Roll” (referring to Chuck Berry) was present, which immediately led to sarcastic criticism that Elvis Presley was not in the picture. Sadly, but not surprisingly, in this age of ongoing conflict, the initial debate garnered many unfiltered statements about how the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame “sucks” because it has been inducting hip-hop and other “non-rock & roll” groups which “don’t belong there.” In keeping with the fiery state of social media these days, the conversation quickly devolved into name-calling, coarse language and an unveiled threat.
As we approach Juneteenth, noting the day when enslaved Africans were finally granted freedom in Galveston, Texas, two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation, I thought it appropriate to share some history about the Kings and Queens of Rock & Roll, as an exercise in civil discourse.
Let’s start by talking about “The King” for a minute. Some call Elvis “The King,” while others offer that title to Chuck Berry, who was in the photo that sparked this intense local debate. Little Richard, however, was fond of referring to himself as “The Architect of Rock and Roll” while crediting Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry as co-creators. If you follow the intersections of the many Delta blues, gospel, and rhythm & blues artists who toured the intentionally segregated Chitlin’ Circuit and the migration of blues artists like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf to Chicago, you will find the synergy, energy and eventual spontaneous combustion that birthed this driving art form.
Many artists helped to cross-pollinate the raucous, secular, sexy, roadhouse dance music that eventually became rock & roll. Among the best-known are Sister Rosetta Tharpe, Fats Domino, Ike Turner, Ray Charles, Ruth Brown, and Big Joe Turner. The white artists were drawn in later by entrepreneurial record producers who recognized that to cross over from “Race Records” to singles that could gain airplay in white urban markets, they needed some “blue-eyed boys” to both deliver recordings and join their touring groups of multiple artists, booking large venues in Northern cities. They brought on “headline” artists like Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Bill Haley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins and others.
Even the straight-up country artists were highly influenced by the African roots of Rock & Roll. The father of country music, Jimmie Rodgers, lived on “the other side of the tracks” as a traveling railroad worker and often collaborated with blues musicians, whom he later brought into the recording studio. Hank Williams’ guitar teacher, Rufus Payne, was a renowned African0-American street musician. Both Williams and Rodgers liberally used traditional blues riffs. They also favored phrasing techniques borrowed from the “Field Hollers” that migrated from the anthem of slavery to the work songs of the cotton pickers, railroad workers, and chain gangs of the Jim Crow South.
By the time the Rolling Stones recorded “Not Fade Away” in 1964 (which Grateful Dead also recorded in 1970), they were covering Buddy Holly, who was covering Bo Diddley, who was using traditional Sub-Saharan African Clave rhythms that were introduced to the U.S. by Cuban jazz artists Mario Bauza and Chano Pozo in the early 1940s.
Gospel, doo-wop, blues, jazz, R&B, soul, funk, zydeco, hip-hop, rap, reggae, mento, dancehall, ska, samba, calypso, rhumba, salsa, Afrobeat and many others are all interconnected and trace their roots to the rhythms of the African diaspora that are the heartbeat of rock & roll. It is fitting and appropriate that the best artists of these many genres join the ranks of bands like Aerosmith, AC/DC, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, and superstars like Eric Clapton and Bruce Springsteen, who all covered Chuck Berry. The Average White Band named themselves as such to honor the incredible irony of a Scottish crew bringing James Brown and Bootsy Collins to American suburbia.
Fast forward to 2025, and some of the hottest tickets are for young, upcoming pop stars of multiple races and ethnicities, working in multiple genres, who trace at least a portion of their musical roots directly to 1970s hip-hop, and so, with or without the controversy of “Kings”, the African beat goes on…
Jeffrey Bowen is a poet, percussionist, journalist, healer, and teacher with multiple publication credits and is a long-time contributor to CoolCleveland. Jeffrey studied Afro-Cuban percussion with Bess Taylor, Baba David Coleman, and Baba Adetobe Ajibilu and Afro-Brazilian rhythms with John Spuzzillo and Marcus Santos. In addition to performing with multiple local bands, his poetry and percussion appear on “Cleveland Tumbadors,” an album of Traditional Afro Cuban Music and Latin Jazz on Fame City Records; on three Cats On Holiday CDs, “Holiday in a Box,” “Livin’ Life & Lovin’ It!” and “Cat Flash” from COH-TONE Records; and he plays congas and percussion on the anitakeys album “Who She Is” from Indie Records.