WATCH: KISS’s Gene Simmons Delivers Emotional Tribute To Chuck Berry
Image by Michael B. Thomas/Getty Images
By Talya Zax April 10, 2017
On April 9, the late, great rock ‘n’ roll icon Chuck Berry was laid to rest.
His funeral, a four-hour affair marked by performances by Berry’s collaborators and tributes from fans ranging from Paul McCartney to Bill Clinton (both in absentia), took place at St. Louis’s Pageant Theater.
Berry, a St. Louis native, lived there throughout his life. Into his last years, he played monthly shows at Blueberry Hill, a bar located on the same street as the Pageant.
Israeli-born Gene Simmons of the band KISS, in town for a comic-book convention, took to the stage to deliver an impromptu eulogy for Berry.
“He broke down the barriers, made all kinds of people’s hearts and minds open up to the idea that we all belong to the same people,” Simmons, disguising tears behind a pair of dark sunglasses, said.
Watch his full speech, below.
The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.
This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism you rely on. Make a Passover gift today!
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Dive In
-
Books What is ‘Zionism without Zion?’ New history asks, but can’t answer
-
Culture In the new Fantastic Four trailer, a glimpse of Yancy Street’s Yiddishkeit
-
Culture ‘Shtisel’ star Sasson Gabay is happy to be back playing a complex haredi Orthodox Jew in ‘Kugel’
-
Film & TV How the Hebrew Bible helped me write He-Man (and a Salvation Army special)
Most Popular
- 1
News Student protesters being deported are not ‘martyrs and heroes,’ says former antisemitism envoy
- 2
News Who is Alan Garber, the Jewish Harvard president who stood up to Trump over antisemitism?
- 3
Fast Forward Suspected arsonist intended to beat Gov. Josh Shapiro with a sledgehammer, investigators say
- 4
Opinion My Jewish moms group ousted me because I work for J Street. Is this what communal life has come to?
In Case You Missed It
-
Fast Forward Is ‘New Absolute Bagel’ real? A sign stirs fretful optimism on the Upper West Side.
-
Opinion Yes, the attack on Gov. Shapiro was antisemitic. Here’s what the left should learn from it
-
News ‘Whose seat is now empty’: Remembering Hersh Goldberg-Polin at his family’s Passover retreat
-
Fast Forward Chicago man charged with hate crime for attack of two Jewish DePaul students
-
Shop the Forward Store
100% of profits support our journalism
Republish This Story
Please read before republishing
We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines.
You must comply with the following:
- Credit the Forward
- Retain our pixel
- Preserve our canonical link in Google search
- Add a noindex tag in Google search
See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.
To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.