Macon Magazine

FAITH, SEXUALITY AND MORTALITY Over the last decade, health problems slowed Little Richard down – sciatica pain, hip replacement surgery that eventually led to him needing a wheelchair full-time and a heart attack. He'd been out of the public eye for some time when, on May 9, Richard's son Danny confirmed that Richard died of bone cancer at his home in Tennessee after several months of illness. Brushes with mortality caused Richard to focus squarely on religion in his later years. Some of his last public appearances, on a Seventh-Day Adventist broadcasting network, find him rejecting homosexuality, urging audiences toward salvation and giving passionate testimony against worldly pursuits like rock 'n' roll. When he gets going, he's as dynamic and compelling as ever, but hearing about the evils of "unnatural affection" is a little painful coming from the man who was so visibly, thrillingly "unnatural" in his heyday that he was the most natural thing in the world. Still, it's a small comfort to hear him say, "Regardless of whatever you are, (God) loves you." Little Richard struggled to balance all his most intense impulses. His sexual desires didn't jibe well with his religious background, and being a religious rock 'n' roll performer felt impossibly hypocritical. He ricocheted between these identities for years, at great damage to himself. "e tragedy of Little Richard is that he demonized his sensuality and buried his career along with it from 1957 to the mid-1960s," said Mercer professor Andrew Silver. "For a time, he decoupled the sacred from queer sexuality, ministry from music. But when he came back, he was preaching the gospel of the fabulous ... trying to invent a way to bring the divine into the world of the sensual." LOVE FOR MACON, GEORGIA "I have taken this beauty all over the world. I have taken it to places where people didn't even think it was beautiful. One man told me: 'Go back to Africa where you came from!' I said, 'Africa? Who told you I was from Africa? I'm from Macon, Georgia. I am a peach.'" To hear Macon tell it, we've been adoring supporters of Little Richard throughout his entire career, but the truth looks a bit different. Maconites who are old enough to remember when Little Richard was still a fixture around the city paint a picture of a charmer, a sharp dresser, a sweet and talented young man who was always singing and performing while working one of his many jobs. But the straitlaced, racist mid-1950s city leadership did not feel that Macon was the place for someone as outrageous as Richard, and he was often not treated well here. "Little Richard was a fearless outsider, and so far ahead of his time that he often seemed alien," said Jared Wright, a Macon-based archivist, curator and musician. "He was a fabulous storyteller and walking myth, yet he was humble and never failed to mention his love for Macon. at love, unfortunately, went largely unreturned during his life. Little Richard's importance to the existence of any musical heritage in Macon cannot be understated and ought to be put on full display." In a late-in-life interview clip, Richard discusses getting run out of town for daring to ride in a car with a white woman. A little investigation into that incident shows that he might have been doing more than riding, but that doesn't excuse the way he was treated, which was so harsh that he refused to return to Macon during the height of his fame. "I didn't go back 'til the fame had died down," Richard said, "and now they're naming streets after me." Eventually Richard reconciled his feelings and became a great public champion of our city. "Little Richard was generous with his love for Macon," said Weatherford. "Despite the racism, despite being taken to the county line and being told never to return, Little Richard never missed an opportunity to talk about his love of Macon, calling it one of the 'greatest places on this earth' on nationally syndicated shows and beyond. No other artist in our city's history has used their platform of fame to do more for Macon than Little Richard." 'ASK LITTLE RICHARD' In 1996, despite the chilly rain, fans lined up behind police barricades hoping to glimpse their favorite musician heading into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame's opening ceremony. "ere were so many stars there – B-52s, members of R.E.M., Travis Tritt, the Pips – but when Little Richard walked in with his presidential entourage, everybody's eyes went to him – like, forget all y'all! Little Richard is HERE!" said Derrick Chatman, who worked at 97.9 WIBB from 1994 until 2002. After the ceremony, Chatman got a little time to talk to the star and was surprised when Little Richard handed over his personal phone number. "He wanted to talk with me about a project he thought should happen in Macon," Chatman said. What Little Richard wanted was an honorary doctorate from Mercer University. "He felt let down that he'd been honored all over the world, but not in his own hometown," Chatman said. Eager to get Richard the recognition he deserved, Chatman wrote a few letters to higher-ups, to no avail. Seventeen years later, Little Richard got his dues, receiving his honorary degree from Mercer while decked out in a blue sparkly suit and matching cowboy boots. "Nobody else remembered that I tried to make this happen years earlier," said Chatman, "except for Richard. He called me, and he thanked me; he remembered." When you called Little Richard, Chatman said, he would disguise his voice as a way to screen his calls. He'd pretend to be someone named Pearl, or an assistant, but Chatman could always tell it was Richard. One day, after making it through Richard's rigorous screening process, Chatman, who had discovered that he could do a spot-on Little Richard impersonation, asked permission to do the famous voice on air. "If you think you can do it, baby, go 'head on and do it," said Richard. So, for four years straight, every Wednesday on the Kevin Koolin' Fox Morning Show, Chatman helmed a segment called "Ask Little Richard." "Every week I had people fooled with that show," Chatman said. 38 maconmagazine.com | JUNE/JULY 2020

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