Chuck Berry

One of my realizations is that if you revel over joy, you're going to ache over pain and get killed over hurt. Your span of feelings are going to go just as far one way as the other.

Everything I wrote about wasn't about me, but about the people listening.

Rock is my child and my grandfather.

In the Fifties, there were certain places we couldn't ride on the bus, and now there is a possibility of a black man being in the White House. You have to feel good about it.

I directed my music to the teen-agers. I was 30 years old when I did 'Maybellene.' My school days had long been over when I did 'School Day,' but I was thinking of them.

Hail, hail rock and roll / Deliver me from the days of old.

I wanted to play blues. But I wasn't blue enough. I wasn't like Muddy Waters, people who really had it hard. In our house, we had food on the table. We were doing well compared to many. So I concentrated on this fun and frolic, these novelties.

That's all there was in our house: poetry and choir rehearsal and duets and so forth; I listened to Dad and Mother discuss things about poetry and delivery and voice and diction - I don't think anyone could know how much it really means.

There has been a great laziness in my soul. Lots of days I could write songs, but I could also take my $400 and play the slot machines at the riverfront casino.

In a way, I feel it might be ill-mannered to try and top myself. The music I play is a ritual. Something that matters to people in a special way. I wouldn't want to interfere with that.

I made records for people who would buy them. No color, no ethnic, no political - I don't want that, never did.

It used to be called boogie-woogie, it used to be called blues, used to be called rhythm and blues...It's called rock now.

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