Here is a nice one day & one tank trip)
if you like Rock & Roll
Little Richards says he is the architect of rock ‘n’ roll.
By WILLIAM SCHEMMEL
Photo:Leah Yetter/Ga Music Hall Of Fame.
For the Journal-Constitution
Macon — Behind its genteel Old South skirts, this city of 100,000 cherishes its old-time blues and rock ‘n’ roll heritage.
The recorded voice of “Little Richard” Penniman “answers” the visitors bureau’s phone. “Hi, this is Little Richard, architect of rock ‘n’ roll, coming to you from my hometown of Macon, Georgia, the song and soul of the South,” says the flamboyant native son, who shouted “Tutti-Frutti,” “Lucille,” “The Girl Can’t Help It” and other blockbusters to the top of the R&R heap in the 1950s and ’60s.
A bootlegger’s son, Little Richard (born Richard Wayne Penniman) cut his musical teeth in churches and Ann’s Tic Toc, a downtown gay bar. It’s now the Tic Toc Room, an upscale restaurant, with a New Southern/American menu, martini and wine lists, a piano bar and a booth where the budding superstar’s stage once stood.
The 76-year-old charter member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame lives in Los Angeles and occasionally makes unannounced visits to his Macon family and friends. Little Richard Penniman Boulevard is a renamed section of Mercer University Boulevard.
You’ll find signs of other famous sons, from the Allman Brothers to Otis Redding, all over town.
Don’t miss
Georgia Music Hall of Fame: On a tune-filled stroll through the downtown Hall of Fame, visitors sit in small theaters and watch videos of gospel, pop and rock performers and listen to their favorites on headphones placed around the galleries. The Music Factory is a kid-oriented learning space with hands-on exhibits in musical composition, style, instrument families and more.
You’ll find tributes to the Allman Brothers Band, which reached the rock music pinnacle in the 1970s. It lives on, even though it has disbanded several times and Duane Allman, one of the Southern rock band’s founding artists, has rested 37 years at Rose Hill Cemetery.
“I’ve Got Dreams to Remember” is a six-month tribute to blues icon Otis Redding, ([Sittin’ On] The Dock of the Bay,” “I Can’t Get No Satisfaction,” “Try A Little Tenderness”) who died at age 26 in a 1967 plane crash in Wisconsin. It winds down on Wednesday at the Georgia Music Hall of Fame.
If you miss the special exhibit, the “Indoor Musical Village’s” year-round collection holds plenty of Redding’s memorabilia, along with that of the other Macon artists, and more than 100 other Peach State stars, from Alan Jackson and Trisha Yearwood to Ray Charles, Lena Horne, bandleader Harry James, lyricist Johnny Mercer and opera diva Jessye Norman. The Georgia Music Hall of Fame, 200 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 1-888-427-6257, www.georgiamusic.org.
Rose Hill Cemetery: Allman Brothers lead guitarist Duane Allman and bassist/vocalist Berry Oakley, who died in separate motorcycle accidents in 1971 and ‘72 near the same Macon intersection, rest side by side in historic Rose Hill Cemetery. The cemetery, 1091 Riverside Drive, is open daily, daylight hours. Contact the Macon-Bibb County Convention & Visitors Bureau, 1-800-768-3401, www.maconga.org.
As in life, the duo seldom want for company. So many people left beer bottles, smokes and other tributes several years ago, a relative wrapped the grave site in chain-link fence, topped with razor wire, to the horror of cemetery sextons, who pulled it down.
The band disbanded and reunited twice during the 1970s. Back together again in 1989, with founding brother Gregg Allman, the group was nominated for Grammys in 2003 and 2004. They still record and perform concert gigs. Next spring, the Allman Brothers Band Museum will open in the Tudor mansion where band members lived and wrote their music.
If you’d like to hear live music, Whiskey River, 4570 Pio Nono Ave., has country and rock bands and a big dance floor, Wednesdays-Saturdays. Hummingbird Stage & Tap Room, 430 Cherry St., has a variety of live music Tuesdays-Saturdays, and 550 Blues, 550 Riverside Drive, offers blues and other music Wednesdays-Sundays.
If you like history and architecture, stop by the opulent Italian Renaissance Hay House, a 24-room treasure of stained glass, statuary, European and American furnishings, silver, crystal, and silk and damask draperies and wall coverings. More than a century before air conditioning, a cleverly concealed ventilation system kept the high-ceilinged rooms cool, even on midsummer days. The Hay House, 934 Georgia Ave., 478-742-8155, www.hayhouse.org.
Around the corner, the Cannonball House achieved lasting notoriety in 1864, when a 12-pound Union shell crashed through the Greek Revival facade and landed in the front hallway. Cannonball House and Macon Confederate Museum, 865 Mulberry St., 478-745-5982, www.cannonballhouse.org.
