Local country singer and all-around musicologist Sherwin Linton sent us this letter, about the Alan Freed Big Beat concert at the Minneapolis Auditorium 50 years ago tonight. Sherwin famously sold an original poster of this concert last year for $20,000, but that’s clearly not the only reason his memory of it is so fond:

Hi Jon and Chris,

Tonight is a night that I always reflect back to when I was 18 years old and all exited because I was going to see Buddy Holly and The Crickets, Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, Larry Williams, The Diamonds and at least ten other acts all on the same show at the Minneapolis Auditorium.

Yea, April 25th, 1958. I had an apartment down on Stevens Ave. and walked to
the show. Maybe it was because I was young and a part of the time, but I
can’t recall being so involved and totally knocked out by anything as I was being
at that show. I still remember it like it was yesterday and it’s still hard
to believe that 50 years have gone by. There sure has been a huge load of
great singers, musicians and entertainers who have left their mark in these past
50 years. What a great life and I can’t wait to see what’s over the next
hill.

Keep Rockin’,

Sherwin Linton

BTW, this wasn’t Buddy’s last performance in town. He played the Prom Center in St. Paul on Jan. 28 as part of the Winter Dance Tour, which of course ended tragically five nights later following a show at the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. Anyone with their own memories of any of these shows, please leave them. I don’t expect that fits the demograophics of our usual music-blog audience, but what the hey.

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