The Big Life of Little Richard

by Mark Ribowsky

The first major biography of Little Richard, a rollicking, nuanced celebration of the late singer/songwriter’s life and his role in the history of American music—gospel, soul, rock, and more

“Tutti Frutti” • “Rip It Up” • “Good Golly Miss Molly” • “Lucille” • “Long Tall Sally” • “You Keep A-Knockin’”

Little Richard blazed the trail for generations of musicians—The Beatles, James Brown, the Everly Brothers, Jimi Hendrix, the Rolling Stones, Elton John, Prince . . . the list seems endless. He was “The Originator,” “The Innovator,” and the self-anointed “King and Queen of Rock ’n’ Roll.” When he died on May 9, 2020, The Big Life of Little Richard—a nearly-completed book—was immediately updated to cover the international response to his death. It is the first major biography of Macon, Georgia’s Richard Wayne Penniman, who was, until his passing, the last rock god standing.

Mark Ribowsky, acclaimed biographer of musical icons—the Supremes, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder, Otis Redding—takes readers through venues, gigs, and studios, conveying the sweaty energy of music sessions limited to a few tracks on an Ampex tape machine and vocals sung along with a live band. He explores Little Richard’s musicianship; his family life; his uphill battle against racism; his interactions with famous contemporaries and the media; and his lifelong inner conflict between his religion and his sexuality.

The Big Life of Little Richard not only explores a legendary stage persona, but also a complex life under the makeup and pomade, the neon-lit duds and piano pyrotechnics, along with a full-body dive into the waters of sexual fluidity.

By 2020, eighty-seven-year-old Little Richard’s electrifying smile was still intact, as were his bona fides as rock’s kingly architect: the ’50s defined his reign, and he extended elder statesmanship ever since. His biggest smash, “Tutti Frutti,” is one of history’s most covered songs—a staple of the pre-Invasion Beatles—and Elvis pivoted from country to blues rock after Little Richard made R&B’s sexual overtones a fundament of the new musical order. Even Hendrix, the greatest instrumentalist in rock history, toured with him before launching a meteoric solo career.

Whenever someone pushes the music and culture of rock to its outer borders, one should turn to Little Richard for assurance that anything is possible.

Genres: Music, Biography, Nonfiction, Religion, History, Cultural

256 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 25, 2020

About the author

Mark Ribowsky is the author of seven books, including the New York Times Notable Book Don't Look Back: Satchel Paige in the Shadows of Baseball. He lives in Plainview, New York.

Reviews

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

"[His songs from the 50's were] sonic gumbo, far from technically perfect, yet the imperfections were precisely what gave this new/old sound its thump, its sweaty realness, the pure exhilaration of feeling good, and feeling horny - rock and roll's fundamental birthright. The most daring songs were the least concerned with good taste." -- the author, on page 38

While the vanguard of early American rock and roll performers can be distilled to a dozen or less names (including Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, and Jerry Lee Lewis), the showiest and most flamboyant of the bunch had to be 'Little Richard' Penniman of Macon, Georgia. Although his hits (such as 'Long Tall Sally' and 'Rip It Up') were primarily all from the years 1955 to 1958, they left quite an impression and even influenced the next generation of rock stars - witness Paul McCartney's 'wooooo!' exclamations on several early Beatles records, or Creedence Clearwater Revival's speedy 'Travelin' Band' as an intended homage to 'Good Golly Miss Molly,' and even Led Zeppelin's 'Rock and Roll' growing out of a jam session as drummer John Bonham was imitating the pounding opening beats to 'Keep A-Knockin.' Hell, hard rock singer / bassist 'Lemmy' Kilmister of Motorhead has been quoted as saying "His records are a joyous good time from beginning to end."

Author Ribowksy was the perfect guy to pen Little Richard's life story, as he brings a lot of the same energy and attention to detail like he did on his earlier excellent Otis Redding biography Dreams to Remember. It was actually sort of amazing how much information was packed into just 200 pages, and it is impossible not to like a wildly descriptive sentence such as "[Little Richard] didn't merely sing a song - he blew it apart and left it all over the walls and floor, embellished with falsetto primal screams that came out as a vibrato 'wooooo!'" (page 73). The self-proclaimed "Queen of Rock and Roll" (in a self-deprecating nod towards his open secret bisexuality) was a complicated and sometimes difficult man, but those dynamic and freight train-tempo songs will live on for a long time.

[Rebecca I · Rating 4 out of 5]

Quite an easy read, full of info on an artist I did not know that much about. What is impressive is the influence Little Richard had on so many other musicians. Also what impressed me is the lasting, classic quality of his music and how rock and roll emerged with the energy of his hits. His personal life was quite conflicted but that seems to be because of the times and religious pressure to have him conform to being in conflict as a gay man. This is an incredible story of all the hurdles and work it took to become a star and continue to remain so through his full life.

[Jay Gabler · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mark Ribowsky calls it "the most famous opening to a song in rock history." Ten syllables, a sung drum fill: a-wop-bop-a-lu-bop, a wop-bam-boom!

In a sense, all of Little Richard's career and legacy boil down to that scat, an electric incantation that it's praise enough to say the rest of "Tutti Frutti" makes good on. That record changed the course of popular music, and while Little Richard would record dozens of worthy follow-ups, "Tutti Frutti" would forever encapsulate, even define his searing contribution to the history of rock and roll.

In Ribowsky's account, the man born Richard Penniman in Macon, Georgia circa 1932 always expected he'd be a star — he just never guessed that song would make his legend. A high-octane gag number, Richard used it to delight his audiences at gay bars and on the Chitlin' Circuit: in its original version, it was absolutely unmistakably about gay sex. That was the hit?

Absolutely, said Specialty Records A&R man "Bumps" Blackwell, who'd urged label owner Art Rupe to sign Richard without having seen him play live. After a disappointing session in New Orleans with the label's session pros — the band heard on Fats Domino's '50s hits — Blackwell went to see Richard's astonishingly energetic show and masterminded the transformation of "Tutti Frutti" into the song we know today, with young songwriter Dorothy LaBostrie steering the suggestive vibe in a heterosexual, while still clearly sexual, direction.

The path to that legendary session takes up the first quarter of Ribowsky's concise 222-page book. The rest is about, essentially, Richard grappling with the instant legacy he'd suddenly created.

I reviewed The Big Life of Little Richard for The Current.

[John Cane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good read

A good read but light on detail.

Plenty of information that I didn’t know beforehand though.

Recommended for a quick read.

[Edward Sullivan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A concise, colorful biography of the complicated, chronically conflicted, dynamic, flamboyant, and enormously influential rock 'n' roll icon.

[Niklas Pivic · Rating 4 out of 5]

Little Richard didn't—as opposed to what he claimed—invent rock 'n' roll, but he undoubtedly shaped it in a major way and made it dangerous.

People came before him, like Fats Domino, but they were non-threatening. Little Richard hit the US of A like a hurricane.

A self-professed omnisexual, natural rhythm machine, creator of 'Tutti Frutti' and countless other rock 'n' roll anthems, this man carried a vocal style that killed, having learned it from the churches he attended growing up. His hair was inches high. He dressed like Liberace decades before he came along.

All of this in the face of abject racism where he faced death and whitewashing:

“I used to get beaten up for nothing,” he once said. “Slapped in my face with sticks. The police used to stop me and make me wash my face. I always tried to not let it bother me. We could stay in no hotels and go to no toilets. I went to the bathroom behind a tree. I slept in my car. I knew there was a better way and that the King of Kings would show it to me. I was God’s child. I knew God would open that door.”

Ribowsky has written a lovely book that's almost as alive as Little Richard's persona and music was, which is quite a feat:

[He] was brash, fast and bombastic . . . . He wore a baggy suit with elephant trousers, 26 inches at the bottoms, and he had his hair back-combed in a monstrous plume like a fountain. Then he had a little toothbrush moustache and a round, totally ecstatic face. He’d scream and scream and scream. He had a freak voice, tireless, hysterical, completely indestructible, and he never in his life sang at anything lower than an enraged bull-like roar. On every phrase he’d embroider with squeals, rasps, siren whoops. His stamina, his drive were limitless and his songs were mostly non-songs, nothing but bedrock twelve-bars with playroom lyrics, but he’d still put them across as if every last syllable was liquid gold. —NIK COHN, Awopbopaloobop Alopbamboom: The Golden Age of Rock

Remember, he released 'Tutti Frutti' in 1955:

Both he and Richard felt deflated as they and Lee Allen retreated to an in-crowd club called the Dew Drop Inn to drink away the blues and find a new groove. As it happened, it would come as if riding a lightning bolt. At the Dew Drop, Richard lost whatever inhibition he had. Getting up on the stage, in his element as bar-goers crowded in front of him, he sat at a piano—or rather, stood above it—and launched into a song he had been performing live for months, but never figured would be acceptable for recording. The first sounds of it were those beguiling syllables that came out as Awop bop a loo mop a good goddamn / Tutti Frutti, good booty.

This, the original parlance of “Tutti Frutti,” had entered his head back where he worked in the kitchen at the Macon Greyhound station during a misspent youth, giggling to himself as he wrote the leering lines about “good booty” and “If it don’t fit don’t force it / You can grease it, make it easy.” Up on a stage, he paid no mind to good taste. He just let it rip. And as he did that, Blackwell was astonished. It was as if the song liberated Richard from the circumspect Richard in the studio. He had swagger, bark and bite, his joy and his growl emanating from a place deep in his soul. He was a different breed of cat, claws out, answerable to any standard of R&B, only himself, with not a compromise in sight.

This book is filled with anecdotes and does, like Little Richard's life, go into a twilight phase nearly half-way in, but not in a bad way. Ribowsky has managed to write a lively, fiercely entertaining, non-stop rollicking book that celebrates Little Richard as the innovator that he was, and, truly, the King of Rock 'n' Roll.

[Jaime Lorite · Rating 4 out of 5]

Muy buen libro, ofrece un retrato muy preciso y completo del personaje y, sobre todo, resulta muy satisfactorio tanto en el plano musical (porque analiza con gran profundidad su obra, lo que aportó, lo que significó y cómo se reaccionó a ella) como en lo concerniente a la descripción de las cambiantes circunstancias sociales que le acompañaron. Quizás me hubiera gustado que ahondara en los motivos por los que el público negro acabó dando de lado a Little Richard, aunque se sobreentiende por la falta de contenido político y reivindicativo en sus canciones y porque, bueno, estaba dando las declaraciones más reaccionarias del mundo en programas de televisión de blancos para solaz y diversión del público blanco, que siento que en cierto modo, con su triste connivencia, acabó viéndole como una mascota. El libro no tiene nada de hagiográfico y, por tanto, no elude los muchos aspectos negativos de Richard, cosa que se agradece porque para eso me habría leído directamente la biografía autorizada. En ese sentido, resulta también superior a la película que se acaba de estrenar, que no rehúye su terrible reconversión homófoba pero da una visión más amable. Precisamente, creo que el libro de Mark Ribowsky demuestra que una mirada crítica hacia Little Richard, lejos de todo revisionismo, despeja la perspectiva y permite apreciar con más nitidez cuáles fueron sus logros incontestables y la grandeza de su influencia.

[Steve · Rating 3 out of 5]

Little Richard was a complicated man who lived an interesting life through which many icons of rock and roll intersected (the Beatles, James Brown, Jimi Hendrix, and the Rolling Stones to name just a few) and that is what made this book interesting. This book sets out the basics of his life and relays the reality of the business of rock and roll that Little Richard lived through, moving labels constantly and moving back and forth between living a wild rock and roll life and a life as a preacher and gospel singer. A good compilation of interesting stories and information about this flamboyant pioneer of rock and roll. I received a free Kindle edition of this book from the publisher through the Goodreads First Reads giveaways.

[Steve · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclaimer: I received this book as part of GoodReads' First Reads program

This book is the biography of a huge star in the musical firmament. Little Richard was a pioneer in just about all areas of rock music from the beginning. He influenced many who would later become huge stars, like the Beatles, Stones, jimi Hendrix and many others. No matter how often his career seemed to be on the rocks, he always managed to rise again from the ashes like a flamboyant phoenix. This book covers it all, from his childhood to his death. Well written and very readable, I cannot recommend it enough.

[John Albers · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an above average portrait of a man who had to deal with racial prejudice, crooked record companies and agents, and sexual identity problems who somehow made some of the best early rock and roll records in the 1950's. Little Richard's records were raw excitement and energy, and his live performances were equally as exciting. A worthwhile read.

[Mediaman · Rating 1 out of 5]

Quickie bio thrown together after Little Richard died, it’s basically an expanded discography that barely mentions his private life and subjectively gushes throughout. It’s essentially a long Wikipedia entry that glosses over lots of the singer’s faults and failures, with no details about many major public and private milestones. The irony of the book’s title is that it’s too short and makes the singer’s life seem small.

There are a few interesting tidbits dealing with the music business, but the last 50 years of his life get’s summarized in 30 pages. I found out he had a son I hadn't known about, but the young man is only mentioned in three sentences in the book. There's almost nothing about his homosexuality, though it's hinted at in a couple spots.

Not worth reading, especially when the author tries to make Little Richard sound like the greatest of all time. He was an early star of rock and roll who spent the rest of his life recovering from delusions of grandeur.

[Dkolacinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

A balanced retelling of the life and times of Little Richard, al warts and weaknesses recapped. Al exccellent read.