Reflecting on Little Richard’s lasting legacy in Macon

Walking down Sunset Strip in 2002, near the famous Duke’s Coffee Shop, a white stretch limo passed Kimberly Kelsey Epps and her mom, Odilee Kelsey.

Epps figured someone famous was likely inside – and was right.

The limo slowed as it passed and a unique figure popped through the sunroof, hollering out a greeting to Epps in an equally unique southern drawl.

“Heeeeeeey, Macon!”

“Little Richard!” Epps said. “It was Little Richard! He shouted hello to me right there on Sunset. I was wondering, ‘Is this real?’ He didn’t remember my name but remembered me and that I was from Macon.”

Epps said Little Richard’s appearing – the sound of his voice – caused the street to stand still for a moment.

“Sunset is so lively, so loud with so much going on but he pierced through it with his high, billowing voice drowning everything out, taking command,” she said. “For that second, people stopped and stared. It was real life. It was Little Richard. I couldn’t have been more proud.”

Epps is known in Macon as a singer, actor, semi-finalist on 2003’s season of American Idol and she’s a frequent performer with Macon Pops, at other shows and in community theater.

She and her mother had flown to Los Angeles to work with producers on songs and recordings.

But remarkably, Epps’ Little Richard story doesn’t stop – or even begin – there.

“On the plane out to LA, I heard someone on our flight who sure sounded a lot like Little Richard,” she said. “Every now and then we’d hear him. Being nosey, I eventually got up to go to the restroom so I could see who it actually was and – yes! – Little Richard, right there on our flight.”

Epps said she immediately waived like crazy and went into star-struck-fan-girl mode. They talked about an hour until it was time to land.

“He was so kind,” she said. “I don’t know what all I said, I was just nervously babbling. I did tell him about the report I did on him in fourth grade and how much I loved and appreciated him. He graciously kept asking about me, though. Did I enjoy singing? What did I sing? When we had to say goodbye I thanked him for being so nice.”

There’s more to Epps’ Little Richard story, but that comes years later.

Penniman’s impact on Macon music

Born Richard Wayne Penniman on Dec. 5, 1932 in Macon, the rock and roll icon died on May 9 in Nashville, leaving behind a flaymboyant and influential legacy.

The thread Penniman wove through lives and history in his hometown shows up in surprising ways and, if you dig, a little more often than you’d imagine. Those in the arts and entertainment community seem keenly aware of his impact. Some, like Epps, have personal encounters and stories while others have had the course of their lives and families altered through his music. Some have no real connection other than the knowing that Penniman, “The Architect of Rock and Roll,” created a legacy for them.

Fellow Macon native Hughes Taylor, 24, guitarist and singer in The Hughes Taylor Band, falls in the latter category.

“No, I don’t have a personal story and honestly Little Richard hasn’t been in my listening rotation,” he said. “But I recognize his influence because the people I listen to and those who influenced me the most thank him and claim his influence. And of course, one of the biggest influences on me, Jimi Hendrix, got his start with Little Richard. To hail from the same place he did is definitely something.”

Artist and Mercer University professor Eric O’Dell is not a native though he is a long-time Maconite. He’s never encountered Little Richard directly but said he can’t say he hasn’t encountered him.

“Weirdly enough, I can tell you at least two things related to Little Richard even though I never met or listened to him a lot,” O’Dell said. “First, like most folks who are Macon transplants, you soon realize that what Macon is in its DNA connects directly to Little Richard. That’s clear. The second thing is a genuinely strange moment one summer when my family and I were in France.”

O’Dell said he spent a teaching summer in Paris. One sunny Saturday he and his family were enjoying a nearby park when a French woman sat alongside them. She knew little English, O’Dell very little French. A “point and say” game ensued with each sounding out object’s names in their own language.

“Finally, I tried to express I was from Macon,” he said. “There was no response to Macon, just a blank stare. I said, ‘Georgia,’ and nothing. Atlanta, nothing. Then for some reason, and I don’t know how it came to me, but I found myself saying, ‘A-wop-bop-a-loo-bop-a-wop-bam-boom.’”

O’Dell said the woman’s eyes lit up.

“Ah,” the woman said, according to O’Dell. “Petit Richard!”

Another Macon transplant, Kirk West, was brought to town through relationship with the Allman Brothers Band. West served as the band’s road manager for decades but spent more years as a rock photographer capturing shots of the most famous. He and his wife, Kirsten, moved to Macon and made the Allman Brothers’ 1960-70s headquarters, the Big House on Vineville Avenue, their home before turning it into a museum. The Wests now also operate Gallery West on Third Street where West shows his work.

But there’s no photo of Little Richard.

“I never photographed him, and that’s really too bad,” West said.

But he doesn’t leave it at that.

“I did get to meet him in a pretty unusual way,” he said. “The band and I were on tour in Los Angeles and I went downstairs and out the hotel front door on my way to the gig. We were staying at the famous Hyatt House, people called it the Riot House. When I got outside there was our drummer, Jaimoe (Johanson), talking to two guys. I walked up and it was Little Richard and George Foreman. Of all things, there I was without a camera in my pocket.”

No picture, but a great memory, he said.

Putting Macon on the map

Rob Evans is a prominent figure in Macon music as a musician, producer and director and chief engineer at what is now Mercer’s Capricorn Studios. He’s also co-owner of Creek Media.

As such, Evans has a deep appreciation for Little Richard.

“I mean, he put Macon on the map in the 1950s, right?” he said. “Those recordings were so visceral and demanded such attention and Little Richard had all the personality to back them up. His legacy is amazing. The Beatles actually opened for him if that gives you any idea. He was instrumental in so many people’s careers and the lives of so many Macon artists who became legendary in their own right. I think it’s definitely time we give him his due and pay real tribute. It’s time we put a statue up – we’ve waited long enough. And we need to do it as community-wide project worthy of him.”

As executive director of the Macon Arts Alliance, Julie Wilkerson is at the center of much of the Macon arts world and agreed it’s time to honor Little Richard.

She also had a momentary brush with the man.

“I saw him here just once,” she said. “He was in a car and even at that he was turning heads with all of us gawking, getting excited and saying, ‘Hey, it’s Little Richard!’ He’s such an icon and was always proud to say he was from Macon, Ga. Among so many great musicians he certainly led the way. I was so sorry to hear of his death but so proud he’s from here. There’s a lot of talk now about a statue. We’re working at the Arts Alliance hoping to bring people together for discussions so something truly significant can be done worthy of his memory. We all want it to make a big statement.”

Among those involved in honoring him with a statue are the Friends of the Little Richard House and the Community Foundation of Central of Georgia who have created a fund at www.cfcga.org/fund/friends-of-little-richard-fund. A replica of Little Richard’s Hollywood Walk of Fame star is also planned for installation at his Macon homeplace while other funds will go toward supporting organizations that provide low-income students with music education.

The architect of rock ’n’ roll

Among those whose lives – even family destinies – were swayed by Little Richard, few can claim the impact Jessica Walden can.

Walden is a Macon writer, businesswoman and, with her husband Jamie Weatherford, owns and operates Rock Candy Tours, the Macon historic music tour company.

Walden’s father is Alan Walden and her uncle Phil Walden, the legendary music entrepreneurs who, among other acts, managed Otis Redding and the Allman Brothers and who partnered with Redding to establish Capricorn Studios.

The story is famously told how as a teenager Phil Walden snuck off to a Little Richard concert at the Macon Auditorium instead of going to the Tri-Hi-Y (later the Macon Health Club) as he’d told his parents.

“Uncle Phil said again and again that seeing Little Richard rattled him to his core and changed the direction of his life,” Jessica Walden said. “My dad loved everything his big brother Phil did and though he didn’t follow him to that concert, he did follow Uncle Phil’s new direction.”

Jessica Walden has much to say about Little Richard and what ripples from his life and music meant to her, her family, to Macon and to the larger entertainment world.

Considering them, there would be no Walden brothers shift toward managing music acts, managing Redding or, so significant at the time, toward breaking racial barriers in the Deep South by partnering so closely with him and others. Without Little Richard’s directional push there would be no Capricorn Records and, if there was an Allman Brothers Band, they wouldn’t be from Macon, Georgia.

The ripples and ramifications go on and on.

“Little Richard is called the Architect of Rock and Roll but without him we wouldn’t have the blueprint we do for what’s followed,” she said. “He inspired. He showed you could be a poor, strange, black kid from the wrong side of the tracks in Macon and still crack the code and make it big. I continue to say Little Richard was lightning that struck and all roads lead back to Little Richard.”

Jessica Walden wrote a play telling the story of Little Richard and early Macon rockers that was presented in 2018 at the Tic Toc Room, a restaurant in what was Ann’s Tic Toc Lounge, the place Little Richard first started washing and banging on pots and pans in the kitchen and a-wop-bop-a-looing on stage.

“It was one of my most favorite things to ever do,” she said. “I poured so much into it. And the setting, the performers, the whole experience was just remarkable.”

Jim Crisp, founding artistic director of Theatre Macon, was tapped to direct and came up with the idea of staging it at the Tic Toc.

Crisp is another Macon transplant who said though his musical upbringing ran toward classical and jazz and Broadway over rock and roll, his awareness and appreciation for Little Richard skyrocketed after coming to Macon as part of its theater and arts community.

Jessica Walden’s play, and Crisp’s staging and casting, bring us back to Epps.

“Kimberly played Little Richard and her performance was like having a hologram of him on stage,” Jessica Walden said. “She channeled his voice, his presence, his manner and was truly amazing. I was delighted with everyone’s work.”

Crisp agreed in glowing terms. Epps said she was at first hesitant to take the role.

“I wasn’t sure I could,” she said. “But I said yes and tried to bring a little of his magic to it. I’m pretty flamboyant myself so I used that. It was an honor to play him. I’ve met a lot of performers and entertainers in my life and some are nice and some are pretentious and so full of themselves.

“Little Richard had such a big, overwhelming personality yet he was kind, so kind. When I heard he had passed away I was very emotional. Thinking of meeting him and getting to share conversation, I just regret I never had the chance to tell him I got to play him. I think he would have been happy about that.”

Contact Michael W. Pannell at mwpannell@gmail.com.