Little Queenie overdubs

On this site we maintain a database containing all Chuck Berry recordings ever published on CD or Vinyl. We welcome every user comment enhancing the correctness of the data listed, such as reader Marty’s recent email regarding the recording of Little Queenie:

We believe there’s a ride cymbal over dub on the original version, what do you think? Because you can hear drum fills and the ride cymbal continues.

As even Odie Payne couldn’t play a two-handed drum fill and a cymbal in parallel, this is a very valid comment. Marty’s email triggered some in-depth investigations and a huge number of emails floating between the contributors to this site.
Today’s technical possibilities allow you to extract, modify and single out parts of a historical recording. This allowed our technical expert Arne Wolfswinkel to both verify Marty’s findings and to discover some additional astonishing facts.
You should know that besides the original 1958 record release we have another, slightly different take of Berry’s classic tune. This “previously unreleased version” (later called “Take 8”) of Little Queenie came into light in 1986, when Steve Hoffman presented to us lost recordings from the vaults of Chess Records. (“Rock’n’Roll Rarities”, CHESS CH2-92521)
Overdubbing was a common practice with Chuck Berry’s recordings at Jack Wiener’s Sheldon Recording Studios. That way the producers could add more Chuck Berry guitar to a recording or more Chuck Berry voice. Even a classic such as Johnny B. Goode was created in such a two-step process. (See the blog article “The Johnny B. Goode Session”)
Overdubbing means that a first recording was made using the full band. During recording, Berry played some of the guitar elements and sung the main vocal. Later the engineer and Berry worked out the finer details such as additional guitar solos or a second voice without the need of the band. The engineer played back a tape containing the original base track, Berry sang or played, and the result was recorded to a second tape. This procedure was necessary, because in the 1950s Chess could not record multiple instruments separately and mix them later.
One example for a guitar and vocal overdub is take 9A of Merry Christmas Baby from the Little Queenie session. This is the variant released on Chess single 1714.
With Little Queenie this overdubbing happened a bit differently. As Marty found, some parts of the drums were recorded for the base track while other parts were recorded during the overdub. And comparing the two slightly different takes of Little Queenie which survived, it becomes obvious that in this session the overdubbing involved not just Berry or Odie Payne, but also Lafayette Leake.
Both takes of Little Queenie are based on the same base track which consists of Berry playing rhythm guitar, Willie Dixon playing double bass and Odie Payne playing the drum rhythm. This base track is 100% identical on both takes.
Different, and thus overdubbed onto this base track, is Berry’s singing, some additional guitar playing, Odie Payne’s cymbal or hi-hat, and Lafayette Leake’s piano. As due to sound degeneration overdubbing was reasonable only onto the first-generation tape, we have to imagine that Berry, Payne, and Leake on this 19th November 1958 were listening to the base track and together added their overdubs.
The correct recording details for both takes of Little Queenie will therefore be:

Chuck Berry     guitar, vocal (overdub), 2nd guitar (overdub)
Ellis "Lafayette" Leake     piano (overdub)
Willie Dixon     double bass
Odie Payne     drums, additional drums (overdub)

We will alter our database accordingly. We will keep the “Take 8” distinction for the alternative even though it is completely unclear where it comes from. The count-in preceding the song (“Are you ready, Chuck?”) on the 1986 album is probably not from the original tape as the guitar intro overlaps the engineer’s announcement which would usually result in an immediate stop to the recording. It is known that Steve Hoffman shuffled such segments around and even created completely new songs from segments of different takes. (For details, read the blog posts “Sweet Little Eight Variants of Sweet Little Sixteen” and “Chuck Berry in Stereo”)
[addition 08.01.2024: Those who know have found that the take 8 introduction has been taken by Steve Hoffman from a tape containing the recording takes of Sweet Little Rock and Roller.]
Run Rudolph Run from the same session uses the same melody and the same rhythm as Little Queenie. And here as well we hear both a guitar overdub and additional cymbal or hi-hat playing.

We would like to thank reader Marty for finding the cymbal overdub and especially for telling us.