Jerry Lee Lewis is still Shakin'

The most interesting man, in my opinion, that we learned about this week was Mr. Great Balls of Fire, Jerry Lee Lewis. When I came home to research him, I was very pleasantly surprised to learn that he is still alive and well. Here is a current picture of him, isn't he precious?

In all honesty, after watching some of his music videos, specifically A Whole Lot of Shakin' Going On he left me quite terrified. His energy is absolutely absurd, and I love it. However, the speed of the music of the music is a bit too fast for me, and gives me a rushed/ anxious feeling. Also, when all of the instruments play at once, specifically in the beginning, the noises begin to mesh in a less than harmonious way, and it sounds like a harsh ruckus for a solid 10 seconds.



Although Lewis' style may not exactly fit my taste, I do really appreciate this man's extraordinary talent. The piano is one of my favorite instruments, as I feel like its music can fit well into basically every genre of music, and he gave the piano such a strong, front stage presence in his work. I really like Boogie Woogie, and I think it is so cool that he was basically one of the founding fathers of the genre. Not once did Jerry Lee Lewis look down at his keyboard while playing, and not only that, he got up and danced and bounced around. He is also extremely vocally gifted, and I love his random outbursts of "WOO!". He also has the most amusing facials when he gets into his music, I can't help but smile at them.

Here is a video clip I found of him from 1983, performing in London. He has visibly aged quite a bit, and a lot of his sparkle and energy are gone, but his talent is still fully in tact.





I also found this cool website about his life, and there is a History Tab you can click on and check out his life story, very cool.
http://www.jerryleelewis.com/

I think it's very unfortunate that his life had to take such a drastic turn when he got so much bad press from the media. It's truly sad to see such talent go to waste, and I wish he had had a more graceful end to his career.