The Life and Times of Little Richard by Charles White

Author:Charles White [WHITE, CHARLES]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-78323-014-3
Publisher: Music Sales Limited
Published: 2013-03-16T04:00:00+00:00

ROBERT PENNIMAN: I fired Hendrix, who was using the name Maurice James all the time I knew him. He was a damn good guitar player, but the guy was never on time. He was always late for the bus and flirting with the girls and stuff like that. It came to a head in New York, where we had been playing the Apollo, and Hendrix missed the bus for Washington, D.C. I finally got Richard to cut him loose. I believe when you’re paying people they’ve got certain obligations. I told Richard, “Hey, man, he can’t keep doing this.” So when Hendrix called us in Washington, D.C., I gave him the word that his services were no longer required. We had some words. I explained why we were doing this. I was running the road for Richard and I didn’t accept that kind of bullshit.

I have read that Richard canned him in England and left him stranded. It makes better reading that way, sells books and things, but it’s a damn lie. I know. I canned Hendrix myself in New York. Later—years later—I was flying some place to meet Richard and the program on the headset kept listing “Jimi Hendrix.” Well I had been reading about this guy making all this money, like a hundred thousand dollars for forty-five minutes, and I mentioned it to Richard. He said, “Robert, do you know who that is?” He let me hang for a couple of minutes; then he said, “That’s Maurice James.” I had never related Jimi Hendrix to Maurice James until then.

The traveling went on, week after week, month after month. A welcome break was a trip to England. Brian Epstein had set up a deal for Richard, headlining a series of concerts at London’s Savile Theatre, with British bands the Alan Price Set, the Quotations, and a new group, Bluesology. The piano player with Bluesology, which opened the shows to shouts of “Off, off” from Richard’s fans, was a young man called Reggie Dwight. He said, “When I saw Little Richard standing on top of the piano, all lights, sequins, and energy, I decided there and then that I was going to be a Rock’n’Roll piano player.” Not long afterward he went solo and changed his name to Elton John.

The British rockers found Richard’s shows as dynamic as ever, though some were a little confused by the homosexual overtones in his act. It was still the hottest rock show in town, however, and the concerts sold out. Richard received nonstop attention from newspapers and television, concluding his visit with a top spot on the BBC’s premier TV rock program, singing his new U.S. release, ‘I Need Love.’

Epstein, impressed by Richard’s tour de force, set up a recording session at EMI’s famous Abbey Road Studios, where such music greats as Caruso, von Karajan, Elgar—and the Beatles—had recorded. The man who produced the session was Norman “Hurricane” Smith, who had just finished working with the Beatles.

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