Known to one and all as "The Killer," mercurial rock & roll pioneer Jerry Lee Lewis was a child piano prodigy. Lewis was barely out of high school when he was signed by Nashville's Sun Records. Rising rapidly to the top of the charts with such hits as "Great Balls of Fire" and "Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On," Lewis was for many years regarded as the chief rival to Elvis Presley. His fortunes declined spectacularly in 1958 when his marriage to his 13-year-old cousin Myra Brown earned him widespread condemnation. After 12 years of performing in seedy night clubs and saloons, he made a spectacular comeback in 1970, only to suffer another setback when one of his later wives died under mysterious circumstances. He managed to survive this and many other scandals, continuing to chart his own professional course in his own way well into the 1980s. He appeared in a handful of films, notably High School Confidential (1958), and in 1988 was impersonated by Dennis Quaid in a flamboyant biopic, Great Balls of Fire. Jerry Lee Lewis is the cousin of evangelist Jimmy Swaggart and night club entrepreneur Mickey Gilley.
by Hal Erickson
biography
