On this day, October 18, 1926, Charles Edward Anderson Berry was born in St. Louis, Missouri. One hundred years later, it’s hard to find a rock guitarist anywhere who doesn’t owe him something. John Lennon once said that if you tried to give rock and roll another name, “you might call it ‘Chuck Berry.’”
To mark the centennial, we’re celebrating the song that sums him up best: “Johnny B. Goode,” the 1958 single about a country boy who could play a guitar “just like ringing a bell.” It’s a two-and-a-half-minute story that helped write the rules of rock and roll, and it has traveled farther than any other rock song, all the way out of the solar system. The official recording is waiting for you at the end of the article.
▶️ Want to hear it first? Scroll down. The original 1958 recording (official audio) is at the end of the article.
A St. Louis Boy from the Ville
Berry grew up in the Ville, a north St. Louis neighborhood where many middle-class families lived. His father was a contractor and church deacon, and his mother was a certified public school principal. He gave his first public performance in 1941 at Sumner High School.
His road to fame wasn’t straight. As a teenager he served time in a reformatory for armed robbery, and in the years after he worked in auto plants, as a janitor, and even trained as a beautician. By 1953 he was playing St. Louis clubs with pianist Johnnie Johnson’s trio, mixing blues with country tunes that amused, and then delighted, his audiences. In May 1955 he traveled to Chicago, met Muddy Waters, and was pointed toward Leonard Chess of Chess Records. His first single, “Maybellene,” sold over a million copies.
The Story Behind “Johnny B. Goode”
Berry wrote the song in 1955 and recorded it for Chess in Chicago, with Lafayette Leake on piano, Willie Dixon on bass and Fred Below on drums. Leonard and Phil Chess produced it, and it was released on March 31, 1958, with “Around and Around” on the B-side.
The song started out as a tribute to Johnnie Johnson but grew into something closer to Berry’s own story. He admitted it was partly autobiographical, and he changed one word in the lyric from “colored boy” to “country boy” so radio would play it. Even the title has a personal wink: Berry was born at 2520 Goode Avenue in St. Louis.
That Opening Riff
Those first few seconds may be the most copied guitar intro in history. Berry borrowed the idea from a single-note solo played by guitarist Carl Hogan on Louis Jordan’s 1946 record “Ain’t That Just Like a Woman,” then turned it into something sharper and louder. Keith Richards later pointed out that the song’s chords feel more like piano chords than guitar chords, a nod to the Johnson influence. Listen, too, for the way the guitar plays straight while the drums and piano swing. That push and pull is a big part of the song’s drive.
How It Did on the Charts
In 1958, “Johnny B. Goode” reached No. 2 on Billboard’s R&B chart and No. 8 on its main pop chart, the one that became the Hot 100 later that year. Those are strong numbers, but its real impact came later. Rolling Stone ranked it No. 7 on its 2004 list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, Billboard’s Jason Lipshutz called it “the first rock-star origin story,” and it was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999.
The Song That Left the Solar System
Here’s a fact that never gets old. When NASA launched the two Voyager spacecraft in 1977, each carried a Golden Record of sounds and music meant to introduce humanity to anyone who might find it. “Johnny B. Goode” is on it, the only rock and roll song in the collection. In August 1989, when Voyager 2 flew past Neptune, Berry played the song at a celebration at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and shared the stage with astronomer Carl Sagan. In 2020, a small crater on Mercury was named after him.
Why It Still Matters
“Johnny B. Goode” gave rock and roll its hero: the kid with a guitar and a dream of seeing his “name in lights.” Generations of musicians took it personally. The Beatles and the Rolling Stones both recorded Berry songs early in their careers, and “Johnny B. Goode” itself has been covered by everyone from Buck Owens to Jimi Hendrix, Peter Tosh and Judas Priest. The Grateful Dead reportedly played it live at least 287 times.
For many fans, though, the most famous cover is fictional. In Back to the Future (1985), Michael J. Fox’s Marty McFly plays it at a 1955 school dance, and a bandleader named Marvin Berry phones his cousin Chuck so he can hear “that new sound you’re looking for.” It’s a great joke, and a sweet tribute.
Berry’s life was not without trouble, including a prison sentence in the early 1960s, and by the 1970s he was touring alone, hiring local pickup bands in every town. But the honors kept coming. He was in the very first class of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on January 23, 1986, where he played “Johnny B. Goode” backed by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band. That same year, Keith Richards organized a 60th birthday concert for him, filmed by Taylor Hackford for the documentary Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll. He received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1984 and the Kennedy Center Honors in 2000.
Still Rocking at Blueberry Hill
Berry never really left home. From 1996 to 2014 he played one Wednesday a month at the Duck Room of Blueberry Hill, a restaurant and bar in St. Louis’s Delmar Loop, and in 2011 an eight-foot statue of him was unveiled across the street. On his 90th birthday, October 18, 2016, he announced Chuck, his first new studio album in 38 years. He died on March 18, 2017, at the age of 90, and the album was released later that year.
Celebrating 100 Years
St. Louis is marking the centennial in style. The Berry family and Isalee Music, the company Berry set up to manage his catalog, have spent two years running a project called CHUCK100, with new EPs of reimagined Berry songs and local events. The centerpiece is an all-star concert at the Grandel Theatre in St. Louis on Thursday, October 22, 2026, with drummer and producer Steve Jordan as musical director and Blueberry Hill owner Joe Edwards as host. Organizers say the show will be filmed for an upcoming documentary.
Listening Tips for the Centennial
- Start with a hits collection. Any good Chess-era compilation will give you “Maybellene,” “Roll Over Beethoven,” “Rock and Roll Music,” “Sweet Little Sixteen” and “Johnny B. Goode” in one sitting.
- Hear the sequel. “Bye Bye Johnny” (1960) picks up the story as Johnny leaves home to chase stardom. The Rolling Stones later covered it.
- Watch him live. Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n’ Roll (1987) captures Berry on stage with Keith Richards, Eric Clapton, Etta James and Linda Ronstadt.
- Hear the last chapter. His final album, Chuck (2017), features his children Charles Berry Jr. and Ingrid on guitar and harmonica.
- If you like this, try: Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” and Bo Diddley’s “Bo Diddley” for more of that first-generation rock and roll spark. You’ll find more from the era in our 50s Rock & Roll and Rock sections.
“Johnny B. Goode” Quick Facts
| Artist | Chuck Berry (born October 18, 1926, St. Louis; died March 18, 2017) |
| Written by | Chuck Berry |
| Released | March 31, 1958 (Chess Records) |
| B-side | “Around and Around” |
| Recorded at | Chess Studios, Chicago |
| Producers | Leonard Chess and Phil Chess |
| Musicians | Lafayette Leake (piano), Willie Dixon (bass), Fred Below (drums) |
| Chart peaks | No. 2 R&B, No. 8 pop (Billboard, 1958) |
| Honors | Grammy Hall of Fame (1999); Voyager Golden Record (1977) |
Find more anniversaries like this one on our On This Day page.
Sources
- Chuck Berry on Wikipedia (with its cited sources, including Rolling Stone and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)
- “Johnny B. Goode” on Wikipedia (with its cited sources, including Billboard and Joel Whitburn’s chart books)
- MetroTix: CHUCK 100 all-star concert, Grandel Theatre, October 22, 2026
- Hoodline: Chuck Berry Turns 100 as St. Louis Family Keeps His Rock Legacy Alive
- Contents of the Voyager Golden Record on Wikipedia
Photo Credits
- Featured image: Chuck Berry in concert in Deauville, France, 1987 by Roland Godefroy, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- Featured image: Chuck Berry performing at the Edmonton Gardens, Alberta, 1957 by Provincial Archives of Alberta, no known copyright restrictions, via Wikimedia Commons
- Featured image: Chuck Berry plays “Johnny B. Goode” at JPL during the Voyager 2 Neptune encounter, 1989 by NASA/JPL, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
- Featured image: Chuck Berry in concert, 2008 by Pablo Vaz, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- In-article image: Chuck Berry’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame by Dietmar Rabich, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
- In-article image: Chuck Berry with fans at the Edmonton Gardens, Alberta, 1957 by Provincial Archives of Alberta, no known copyright restrictions, via Wikimedia Commons
- In-article image: Chuck Berry and Carl Sagan at the Voyager 2 Neptune flyby celebration, 1989 by NASA/JPL, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
