Johnny B. Goode

Johnny B. Goode is the first song on Timothy Rock. It's one of the songs at the very roots of rock and roll. It was published by Chuck Berry in 1958 (11 years before I was born) and many people think it's one of the greatest rock and roll songs of all time. In fact, NASA though it was so great that they sent it into space on the Voyager spacecraft for aliens that might find Voyager one day to listen to.

I put it first on the CD because it is a very early rock and roll song, but also because it tells the story of the rock and roll dream: a kid with no money or education gets a guitar, learns how to play it, and becomes famous. Many of the songs on Timothy Rock are retelling parts of this story.

In the movie Back to the Future, there's a really funny scene where Marty performs this song at a high school dance in 1955.

By the way, the recording on your CD isn't actually Chuck Berry but a band called The Grateful Dead.

Deep down Louisiana close to New Orleans
Way back up in the woods among the evergreens
There stood a log cabin made of earth and wood
Where lived a country boy named Johnny B. Goode
Who never ever learned to read or write so well
But he could play the guitar just like a ringing a bell

Go go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Go Johnny go
Go
Johnny B. Goode

He used to carry his guitar in a gunny sack
Go sit beneath the tree by the railroad track
Oh, the engineers would see him sitting in the shade
Strumming with the rhythm that the drivers made
People passing by they would stop and say
Oh my that little country boy could play

(Chorus)

His mother told him "Someday you will be a man,
And you will be the leader of a big old band.
Many people coming from miles around
To hear you play your music when the sun go down
Maybe someday your name will be in lights
Saying Johnny B. Goode tonight."

(Chorus)

The William Tell Overture - Finale

An overture is an introduction to a piece of music or a group of related pieces. It usually contains the main musical themes that are found throughout the rest of the music. In the case of the William Tell overture, it is the introduction to a four-hour opera by Gioachino Rossini. The overture itself is in four parts, but I've just included the last part. I included it as a fun, dramatic opening and because I thought it might be familiar to you.

It was famously used as the theme music for an old radio and TV show called "The Lone Ranger". You actually probably know the second part, "Call to the Cows", too. It was often used in Warner Brothers cartoons to signify the beginning of the day.

William Tell was the last of Rossini's 39 operas. William Tell himself was a (legendary?) Swiss figure who is best known for shooting an apple off the head of his own son with an arrow. He didn't do it for fun, though. A cruel representative of the emperor forced him to do it. Later, Tell killed him, a situation that eventually led to a rebellion against the emperor and the formation of the Swiss Confederation.