A Letter to Jerry Lee Lewis

A Christmas Letter to Jerry Lee Lewis
God Knows Where

Dear Jerry Lee,

I received the Oxford American Southern Music Issue #10 (OA #63) for Christmas. Your picture's on the cover and they selected "Hold On I'm Coming" for your song on the two CD offering. I've listened to it about a hundred times in the last three days.

Way back on page 160 there's a quote from you: "My only regret is that I've never sat in the audience and watched a Jerry Lee Lewis show."

Well, Killer, let me tell you how it is! Back in the olden days in the late 1950's, Columbus Mississippi had the City Auditorium for gospel quartets and wrestling and the annual Pilgrimage Pageant.

One magic night you came to town and I was there!

This being almost 2009 and all, some of my memory has faded. I'm not sure if you were the opening act or the main act or the only act. One thing's for sure - you are the only act I remember.

I was seated toward the back of the Auditorium when you came out on stage. Between the whistling and hollering and jumping up and down, I thought you had on a kid's rain slicker. Your blond pompadour and shiny yellow suit dazzled me and I whistled and hollered and jumped even more. Then you started singing.

And did you sing!

At the end you were sitting on top of the upright piano and playing/stomping with your shoes. I always worried how the Blackwood Brothers Quartet would be able to perform, next time they were in town, if you tore up the piano. Then I read the article in OA about you pulling into another town for another gig with a piano in a little trailer behind your Cadillac convertible. So maybe you were kicking your own piano in Columbus Mississippi that night.

So I hate that life being what it is kept you from watching your own performance. It was life changing for me. I wish you could have been on the stage and sitting with me at the same time. Now, that would have been way cool for both of us.

You said it best, "just think what a dull world this would be without a Jerry Lee Lewis in it."

Thank you, Jerry Lee, for being in my world! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

The Christmas Eve Davis Patty Let Me Sing "O Holy Night"

The Christmas Eve Davis Patty Let Me Sing "O Holy Night"

People, Episcopalians and Baptists and Methodists and all the rest of us, came from miles around for St. Paul's Christmas Eve Midnight service in Columbus. People who weren't sure whether to kneel or stand or take communion came. It was the thing to do.

I grew up in First Baptist Church in Columbus and, after a college summer in the mountains of Vermont, joined the Episcopal Church. I had been a music major at Mississippi College in Clinton and was destined to be a Minister of Music in a Southern Baptist Church somewhere.

I'll never forget telling Dr. Woodson, the minister at First Baptist Church, that I was going to join the Episcopal Church. Dr. Woodson said, "Oh son, if you aren't finding what you need in the Baptist Church, try the Methodist Church but don't join that Episcopal Church!"

But, I did and a few years later ended up back in Columbus with a wife and two babies. We attended St. Paul's Episcopal Church pretty faithfully. I sang in the choir.

For decades, one of the highlights of St. Paul's Christmas Eve service was Davis Patty singing "Oh, Holy Night". Davis was a bachelor and a banker at Merchants and Farmers Bank. He attended the opera in New York City and gave elaborate dinner parties (somebody tried to eat a lace doily one night) and had a radio program on Sunday morning on one of the local stations. He even conducted church services in Macon when they didn't have a priest, but his real claim to fame for me was "Oh, Holy Night".

So, this one Christmas Eve I showed up at St. Paul's for the service and Davis couldn't talk. He whispered or wrote out (I'm foggy on how he communicated with me) that he couldn't do "Oh, Holy Night" and it was up to me to pull it off. If it had existed in those days, I would have responded "OMG!" But it didn't, and I'm pretty sure I thought "Thank You, Jesus!!!!!"

I'm not Davis Patty, and I never was, but I did the best I could that night and he said I did OK. I'm pretty sure it was better than the Christmas Eve service I did "Ave Maria" in Latin.

As in all good treasure hunts, it gets harder and harder. This is Version 3 of Where In Maryland In Annapolis.

As before in Version 1 and 2, take your family and friends to downtown Annapolis to have fun and look for the exact location of these photographs. The first ten folks who email me at billburnette@ymail.com, with the exact geographic location of all four photographs will receive a free, signed, framed original photograph of your choice. Just let me know what you like, and I will come as close as possible. Everybody, after the first ten, gets bragging rights and the opportunity to purchase an original Bill Burnette photograph. So do it now, and get the free stuff!

Where In Maryland In Annapolis 2

Same rules for the second edition of the Where In Maryland treasure hunt. Take your Mom and Dad, or significant other, to look for these exact locations in Annapolis, Maryland. The first 10 folks who email be at billburnette@ymail.com with the correct location of all four photographs will receive a free, framed, signed photograph of your choice. Everybody else, after the first ten, gets bragging rights and the ability to purchase a photograph from Annapolis photographer Bill Burnette. Just email me at the same address. Christmas is coming! A unique gift is priceless!

Volvo Race Around The World