Little Richard

"Tutti Frutti" came out in 1955 and changed music. It left Little Richard with almost nothing.

The first thing that happened was that Pat Boone, a white singer with a smooth voice and a clean sweater, recorded his own version a few months later. Boone's went higher on the pop chart than the original.

It was the method of the era: the white record company took the Black hit, smoothed it out, and the original stayed down below.

The second thing happened in 1959, and it was worse, and he did it to himself.

The 1959 signature

Little Richard was at the top when he decided to drop everything and become a preacher. He said afterwards that he had been on a plane in trouble and had promised God he would retire if they landed.

When he broke with Specialty Records he gave up his royalties. He signed his way out and left behind the rights to the songs he had made.

It took him twenty-five years to try to get them back. He sued in 1984 for a hundred and twelve million dollars and the case ended in an out-of-court settlement in 1986.

The man who laid the first stone of an entire industry spent much of his life fighting to collect something from it.

The other signature on "Tutti Frutti"

And there is a name in the credits of "Tutti Frutti" that almost never gets mentioned.

The original lyric Richard sang in the clubs was obscene and there was no way to record it. In the studio they hired Dorothy LaBostrie, a songwriter from New Orleans, to rewrite the whole thing on the spot.

She did. The song was recorded that same afternoon, in the fifteen minutes of session time that were left.

LaBostrie is credited as co-writer. The opening scream — that burst of meaningless syllables that begins the song and can almost be taken as rock's birth certificate — was his. Everything else sung over the top is hers.

What he said, and what he said afterwards

Here the whole story has to be told, because told by halves it comes out false in either direction.

Little Richard was explicit about his sexuality for almost all his life, at a time when that was not done. In his 1984 authorised biography he said he had been gay all his life. In his own words he also described himself as omnisexual. He wore make-up, piled his hair a foot high and went on stage like that in the segregated South of the fifties.

And in 2017, by then an old man, on a religious channel, he publicly disavowed all of it. He said homosexuality and trans identity were unnatural and called on people to seek God.

Both things are his. The flag and the repentance.

That is why it does not work to turn him into a clean symbol, nor to erase what he did. He was a person torn between two things he felt were incompatible, and that fracture lasted him seventy years: he left music for the pulpit several times and came back just as often.

What there is no doubt about is who he opened the door for. David Bowie, Prince and Lady Gaga came through a door that was open because he had pushed it first.

What he left playing

If Chuck Berry drew rock and roll's blueprint, Little Richard set it on fire.

The piano hammered standing up, the voice climbing to a shriek, the speed, the nerve. "Long Tall Sally", "Good Golly Miss Molly", "Lucille", "Rip It Up".

Paul McCartney learned to scream by copying him, and has said so all his life. James Brown took him as a model. Elvis recorded his songs.

He proclaimed himself the architect of rock and roll. It was one of those boasts that turn out to be exact.

What to remember

Little Richard is proof that inventing something and keeping something are two different things.

Put on "Tutti Frutti", "Long Tall Sally" or "Lucille" and you will hear the most incendiary thing rock has produced, recorded in 1955 and 1956, when the mould those songs were creating did not yet exist.

And bear in mind the three things you cannot hear. That a white singer's smoothed-out version outsold his. That in 1959 he signed and lost the rights. And that half the lyric that made history was written, on the spot, by a woman whose name almost nobody remembers.

He died in 2020. Remember him this way: he screamed first, and he was paid least for that scream.

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Sources

Little Richard, real name Richard Wayne Penniman, born in Macon, Georgia, on 5 December 1932 and died in Tullahoma, Tennessee, on 9 May 2020. An American singer and pianist, one of the founders of rock and roll. "Tutti Frutti" was recorded in New Orleans in September 1955; the original lyric, considered obscene, was rewritten in the studio by the songwriter Dorothy LaBostrie, who is credited as co-author. Pat Boone's version, released shortly afterwards, reached a higher position than the original on the American pop chart, in a practice common at the time whereby white artists re-recorded hits by Black artists. That song was followed by "Long Tall Sally", "Good Golly Miss Molly", "Lucille" and "Rip It Up". In 1959 he left music to devote himself to preaching and, on breaking with the Specialty Records label, gave up the rights to his recordings; he sued in 1984 claiming 112 million dollars and the litigation was resolved by an out-of-court settlement in 1986. Throughout his life he alternated between his musical career and religious preaching. He referred publicly to his sexuality on numerous occasions: in his 1984 authorised biography he stated he had been gay all his life and described himself as omnisexual; in 2017, in an interview on a religious television channel, he disavowed those statements and called homosexuality and trans identity unnatural. His influence is acknowledged by Paul McCartney, James Brown, Elvis Presley and a long list of later artists, and his androgynous image anticipated figures such as David Bowie, Prince and Lady Gaga. He entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1986, in its inaugural class. Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Paul McCartney, James Brown, David Bowie, Prince and Lady Gaga have their own profiles in this series. Externally authored text, edited and verified for Rebobinados. Interpretations of the meaning of his work are offered as the author's reading. No song lyrics are reproduced, for copyright reasons. Information drawn from Rolling Stone, Britannica, Wikipedia, The New York Times and other coverage.