Jerry Lee Lewis Flies Away!

 

by Pa Rock

Music Fan

American rocker and piano-pounder Jerry Lee Lewis passed away yesterday at his home in DeSoto County, Mississippi.  He was eighty-seven.  Lewis, who was among the first set of artists inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, was also a member of the Country Music Hall of Fame.   In addition to those two musical genres, he was also known for performing gospel music, including a rocking version of  Albert Brumley's "I'll Fly Away."

Jerry Lee Lewis grew up in Ferriday, Louisiana, playing along the banks of the Mississippi River with his two equally boisterous cousins, Mickey Gilley and Jimmy Swaggart.  All three were talented piano players and performers.  Mickey Gilley passed away earlier this year, and I posted a remembrance of him in this blog on May 9, 2022, which was titled "Mickey Gilley has Left the Stage."  Reverend Swaggart lives on.

Jerry Lee Lewis was a controversial character.  As a young man of twenty-three his career was sidetracked and almost wrecked when a London journalist discovered that Lewis was married to his 13-year-old cousin.  Some sources say the girl was actually twelve when they were first married.  Years later a television documentary suggested that his stage nickname of "The Killer" might be well deserved when it implied that he could have had some involvement in the death of his fifth wife (of seven).  Also, in 1976 at his 41st birthday celebration, Lewis accidentally shot his bass player, Norman Owens, in the chest.  Owens survived the shooting.

Fifty years or so ago I had the good fortune to see Jerry Lee Lewis at a live show at the Shrine Mosque win Springfield, Missouri, where he shared the program with Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton. It was an amazing show, and Jerry Lee did everything that could possibly be done with a piano on stage short of setting it on fire!  Then, in 2008, during this blog's first year of existence, my youngest son suggested that I might write about that show in this space.  On August 26, 2008, I met that challenge with a posting entitled "Great Balls of Fire."  The following was taken from that essay:

"Jerry Lee Lewis (and Cousin Mickey, too, for that matter) can do anything with a piano.   That night he pounded out several songs and then ended the show with his signature number, Great Balls of Fire.  Our group was standing watching Jerry get crazy at the piano, and he was standing also.   The music was raging by the time he kicked the piano bench off of the stage and into the audience.  And then he was pounding the keyboard with his butt, and then he was back to leaning over the ivories and attacking them with both hands - never missing a note or a beat - and then . . . and then we all gasped in amazement as 'the Killer' lunged into the final few bars of the song with both hands and a foot beating Great Balls of Fire  out of a piano that was probably just as shocked as we were!"

What a showman!