Chuck Berry
Born in St. Louis in 1926, Chuck Berry is a true pioneer of rock ’n’ roll music. By the mid-1950s, Berry had already recorded Maybellene with Chess records, a single that hit #1 on the Billboard Rhythm & Blues charts in September 1955. By the late 1950s, Berry was an established star with several hit records and a couple of film appearances to his name. Berry hit a speed bump on the road to fame when, in December 1959, he was arrested for having sex with a 14-year-old Apache girl whom he had transported over state lines to work as a hat check girl in his nightclub. In March 1960, Berry was convicted, fined $5,000, and sentenced to five years in prison. His sentence was later reduced to three years following an appeal. Berry served one-and-one-half years and was released in October 1963. After his release, Berry continued recording and performing, due in part to the British invasion acts of the 1960s—most notably the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, who both released cover versions of his songs. In 1986, Chuck Berry was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Many of his songs have been selected to Rolling Stone Magazine "greatest of all time lists."
