late March, 2005
Currently in the news: Songy/BMG UK's release of Elvis Presley singles
- The C&O, rails and Elvis converge in Cumberland: Weekend concert series in Western Maryland
By Joanne E. Morvay
(Baltimore Sun, March 31, 2005)
What do George Washington and Elvis have in common with the C&O Canal and the Western Maryland Scenic Railroad? This weekend, they all come together in Cumberland. The Western Maryland city - home to the canal and the railroad and once George Washington's military headquarters - hosts Elvis in concert Saturday night. Elvis is impersonator Matt Lewis, star of the Las Vegas "Legends in Concert" revue. Cumberland's weekend concert series also features Garth Brooks and Shania Twain lookalikes and a big-band show. ...
- Here in spirit(s): Elvis-inspired wines making a splash
By Peg San Felippo
(Palm Beach Post, March 31, 2005)
Here's a wine to get all shook up over: It's the Elvis Presley wines produced by Graceland Cellars. The first vintages of Elvis Presley vinos were released last fall and sales have been extremely strong. "We launched Graceland Cellars as a tribute to the King of Rock 'n' Roll," said Scott Cahill, president of Graceland Cellars' parent, Signature wines. The winery is in Hayward, Calif., a northern coastal area. "But while the soul of our company is in Memphis, our products are firmly planted in innovative California winemaking." Getting Elvis Presley Enterprises to allow them to use the trademark took time and assurance of a quality product, he said. "We couldn't ask for a better partner than Elvis Presley Enterprises. People feel a real connection to Elvis and that opens the doors to our wines. The quality in the bottle is what brings them back." Graceland Cellars is releasing 20,000 cases of the wines this year; area buyers can expect to see them in retail shops within the next month. Blue Suede Chardonnay, Jailhouse Red Merlot, and The King Cabernet Sauvignon will have a suggested retail price of $12 a bottle. "Wine and celebrations go hand-in-hand," Cahill said, "What could be more fun than bringing Elvis to a dinner party?"
- Former country singer writes about stardom
By Caryn Rousseau
(ardmoreite.com / Associated Press, March 30, 2005)
It took defeating a deep depression, 12 years and three worn-out typewriters for Maxine Brown to pen her story of singing country music across America with such stars as Elvis Presley and Johnny Cash. With the release of ''Looking Back to See: A Country Music Memoir,'' Brown was thrilled to put her story about the early years of country music out in the world. ...
- PRESLEY HID GIFTS ELVIS GAVE LISA MARIE
(contactmusic.com, March 30, 2005)
PRISCILLA PRESLEY used to hide expensive and inappropriate treats her estranged husband gave her daughter LISA MARIE, so that people wouldn't poke fun at the youngster. The German-born socialite upset her daughter time and again by taking away gifts her father had bought her - because they weren't the kind of things a little girl should have. Presley recalls, "He gave her a fur coat that was a mink coat and she brought it home. I think he gave it to her for her birthday and I said, 'You're not wearing this. This is not for you. You're five years old.' "I called him up and I said, 'What are you doing?' It was just too much. "Even though a child doesn't put a lot on it, others put a lot on it. The comments from other people: 'Oh my God, she has this, she has that,' that really bothered me. "I would take things and put it in the closet... He gave her a little diamond ring one time when she was about six-years-old. I would take that. She'd love it and then she'd forget about it." Mother and daughter teamed up for their first TV interview together on yesterday's (29 MAR 05) OPRAH show in America.
- Elvis revisited
Compiled by David Walton
(The Courier-Journal, March 28, 2005)
The two most important women in Elvis Presley's life will sit down with Oprah Winfrey this week. Lisa Marie Presley, 37, will talk about her legendary father on today's show (4 p.m. on WHAS). She will be joined by her mother, Priscilla Presley, 59, tomorrow when the two will share what life was like with Elvis. ...
Priscilla, left, Lisa Marie and Oprah
- Almost Elvis: An IGNFF scoop confirmed!
(FilmForce, March 28, 2005)
The official Elvis Presley website has posted a new interview with the producer and director of CBS' forthcoming miniseries, Elvis. "While we were interested in doing the film, we felt that with such an iconic figure [as Elvis Presley], we didn't want to move forward without the blessing of the Presley family and the estate," explained producer Robert Braunstein. "Once they agreed to cooperate with us, they also opened up their archives so that we could really show Elvis in a way that hadn't been seen before." The Presley estate even allowed the production to use actual Elvis master recordings, a first for a biopic. "In the mini-series, we see Elvis between the ages of 18 and 33 and we learn about his upbringing how poor he was," Braunstein added. "We see his musical influences, watch his rise to fame and get insight into his relationships with the key people in his life including his mother, Gladys, his manager Colonel Tom Parker, Ann-Margret and Priscilla." ...
- ROCKWELL: 'ZAPHOD IS A BIT LIKE ELVIS'
(contactmusic.com, March 28, 2005)
Actor SAM ROCKWELL's alien character in the upcoming movie adaptation of THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY is based on a mixture of famous Americans. The 36-year-old star introduced an ELVIS PRESLEY quality to his portrayal of space monster, ZAPHOD BEEBLEBROX after jokingly impersonating the rock 'n' roll king with actor VINCE VAUGHN. And from that point on, Rockwell couldn't stop bringing other famous Americans to the role. Rockwell explains, "Vince and I were taking it in turns to be Elvis, just playing around. From that improv came this kind of Elvis/Vince amalgam. "Zaphod is a bit of Vince, a little Elvis, with some BILL CLINTON and a few other things too. Maybe even a dash of GEORGE W BUSH."
- Jackson gives rare interview
(Capital News 9 / Associated Press, March 27, 2005)
Michael Jackson said he was drawing on his faith to get through his child molestation trial. The famed pop star gave a rare interview Sunday on the Reverend Jesse Jackson's radio show. Jackson said he gains strength from God, and in knowing that Jackson is innocent. Jackson said, "It's very sad, it's very very painful. I pray a lot, that's how I deal with it. I'm a strong person, I'm a warrior and I know what is inside of me. I'm a fighter, but it's very painful at the end of the day." Jackson also denied allegations that he was broke. He said his Sony music catalog, which includes Beatles and Elvis Presley songs, is very valuable.
. ...
- Irish Tenor, Josef Locke, Derry 2005
By Maurice Colgan
(PRLEAP.COM, March 27, 2005)
A beautiful artistic memorial sculpture to Josef Locke was unveiled in Derry 22 March 2005. Taking part in the unveiling ceremony was Nobel Peace Prize recipient John Hume, and Phil Coulter the pianist, and songwriter. Phil Coulter wrote, "My Boy", a song recorded by Elvis Presley, and the poignant ballad, "The Town I Loved So Well", a Josef Locke favourite. The "Derry Journal", "the Irish News" and many more newspapers first reported my Josef Locke statue idea in June 2003. The BBC, Highland radio, and LMFM Radio invited the writer to talk on-air about the ambitious proposal. ...
- Jolson: A 1920s Elvis - Performer's life story to be unraveled at Munster theater
By WALTER SKIBA
(Northwest Indiana Times, March 27, 2005)
When Mike Ehlers appeared in "Cats" at Broadway's Winter Garden Theatre, which had showcased the legendary Al Jolson for almost two decades, he had no idea he would one day be playing the man called the "World's Greatest Entertainer." "Jolson & Company," the Off-Broadway celebration of the life and songs of Jolson (1886-1950), begins previews on Thursday, and runs through May 8 at Theatre at The Center in Munster. "Jolson was to 1920s audiences what Elvis became in the '50s," artistic director William Pullinsi says. ... The play brings out his flaws as well as his strengths. Egocentric, driven and hard to warm up to offstage, Jolson could comfortably display his most real self onstage, Ehlers says. Seeing people's faces and feeling their energy encouraged him to reveal a vulnerability they could relate to. Ehlers believes that the death of Jolson's mother when he was 8 may have accounted for much of his drive and the unfeeling behavior that contributed to three failed marriages. ...
- Tabloid Photo Collection Part Of Anthrax Cleanup
(tbo.com / Associated Press, March 27, 2005)
Pictures of Elvis in his coffin and boxes of other photos will be decontaminated in the final cleanup at the former headquarters of a supermarket tabloid that was the first target in a series of anthrax attacks. A collection of 4.5 million images, along with 305,000 pounds of news clippings, pictures and periodicals once owned by American Media Inc. had been stored in sealed containers since someone mailed anthrax to the building in October 2001. ...
- Make it to MEMPHIS
By Cynthia V. Campbell
(The Advocate, March 27, 2005)
Memphis, Tenn., makes an impression. Like many southern cities, the town combines a heady mixture of Old South traditions and New South entrepreneurship. Visitors find sizzling music and spiced up attractions while being smothered with hospitality. Perched on a bluff above the Mississippi River, the town takes a cue from the river. Like many river towns, it goes with the flow. And the flow these days means rock 'n' roll, barbecue, blues, art exhibitions and downtown rejuvenation. Visiting during the recent Travel South Marketplace, I took time to explore. The biggest surprise was the vibrancy of the downtown area. It's not perfect. There are still empty storefronts, but new and renovated hotels and cafés are filling spaces vacated by businesses that have moved to the suburbs.
"I'm so proud of downtown," said Jackie Reed of the Memphis Convention and Visitor's Bureau. "Not so many years ago, Memphis was a weekend town. Now if people want to enjoy the city, all they have to do is pick a starting place," she said.
"People always come for Elvis and Graceland, but once they experience the city, it's so memorable," said Reed. "Once here, you get Memphis with the full flavor. This city grows on you." ...
- Men who got diddley squat
By Guy Blackman
([Melbourne] Age, March 27, 2005)
Bo Diddley and George Clinton rank among popular music's great innovators and hardest-working live acts. But it hasn't made them rich. Veteran rock'n'roller Bo Diddley is a teetotall, fiercely anti-drug musician who had one visionary idea 50 years ago and has run with it ever since. Funk legend George Clinton, however, is a free-spirited wildman, whose cornucopia of musical innovation from the late 1960s onwards has always been heavily drug-assisted, and who was arrested as recently as 2003 and sentenced to 200 hours of community service for possession of crack cocaine.
Diddley is an inveterate lonerer, crisscrossing the globe year after year in a never-ending succession of one-night bookings, backed by either the Debbie Hastings Band from New York, or whatever pick-up band the local promoter can organise. Clinton, meanwhile, has one of the largest and most chaotic groups on the planet, an ever-changing 30-piece ensemble filled with his children, grandchildren, old friends and raw recruits.
On the surface these two hugely influential artists, both playing shows in Melbourne this week, seem worlds apart in style and attitude. But delve a little deeper and you'll find parallels: here are two men completely obsessed with music, driven to play on and on, both holding out hope for some eventual payout for their decades of effort.
... Bo Diddley also struggled to maintain the momentum of his groundbreaking first recordings, seeing himself gradually superceded by pretenders to the rock'n'roll crown. Although Elvis Presley cut his first record That's Alright Mama in 1954, and Bill Haley and the Comets' Rock Around The Clock is often credited as the first rock'n'roll record, Diddley sees himself as coming before all others. "I am the originator," he says. "I'm the one that started the mess in the first place. I built this monster, this little rock'n'roll monster, and now I gotta feed him."
Diddley maintains that white musicians like Presley and Haley popularised an African-American musical form and went on to take all the credit - and the spoils. "Well, they did," he says. "There's no sense in me lying about it - they did. And they were paid, I wasn't. I'm not going to tell you that I'm not bitter about it, because I would be lying. I don't think it was right, and insome cases it's still going on. But I'm all right. I ain't got time to be getting crazy about that because it takes too much time to be involved in that crap." In fact, the most disheartening similarity between Clinton and Diddley is that they have both been recording for five decades and have yet to see much money for their efforts. "I ain't seen a royalty cheque in my life - somebody's playing big-time bank for me," says Diddley. "My existence is from what I've done throughout the years on the road." ...
- New Senate Leader Has Many Talents
(KOTV / Associated Press, March 26, 2005)
The new leader of the Oklahoma Senate likes to delve into the nitty gritty work of the state budget and does a mean impersonation of Elvis Presley. ``He's a great singer. Once his political career is over, he could be on American Idol,'' says Betty Kerns, a longtime friend and former political consultant to Sen. Mike Morgan, D-Stillwater. ...
- Songwriter Is Latest Addition to Mag's Tin Pan Alley
By Fred Bronson
(Yahoo! News / Reuters / Billboard, March 26, 2005)
Up-and-coming songwriters break into the music business in many different ways. Some attend workshops, some drop off their demos at music publishers' offices, and a very select few of them worked for Billboard before appearing on one of the magazine's charts. ... In 1971, U.K. vocalist Tony Christie had a No. 18 hit in his home country with the Neil Sedaka/Howard Greenfield song "(Is This the Way to) Amarillo." Reissued to benefit Comic Relief, the song finally reaches No. 1 some 34 years after its initial release. That puts some very veteran U.S. songwriters in the top four positions of the U.K. chart. Sedaka's high school classmate Carole King wrote "You've Got a Friend," which dips 1-2 for McFly. Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller and Doc Pomus are the composers on "She's Not You," the reissued Elvis Presley single that debuts at No. 3. And "Fiddler on the Roof" songwriters Sheldon Harnick and Jerry Bock receive credit on "Rich Girl," a No. 4 debut for Gwen Stefani featuring Eve. ...
- Elvis rock tribute makes comeback
(BBC News, March 26, 2005)
A well-known landmark, with a link to Elvis, has re-emerged as mysteriously as it disappeared. A roadside rock, daubed with the King of rock and roll's name, had for decades greeted drivers as they made their way into Aberystwyth. Recently the rock face was chipped away and many who remembered the landmark contacted the BBC earlier this year. But someone has carved and painted the rock again and, like the real Elvis, it has made a comeback. The rock, on the A44, has been given a new flat face and, in white paint, Elvis has been immortalised in mid Wales once again.
Who exactly is responsible for the new Elvis rock is not known. Equally, it is unclear who destroyed the original. When the Elvis rock disappeared earlier this year, people contacted the BBC and said they want to see the music legend's Aberystwyth rock again, as did the men responsible for painting it more than 40 years ago. John Hefin, from Borth, in Ceredigion, a former head of drama at BBC Wales, and his friend David Meredith, from Llanuwchllyn, near Bala, first painted the rock in 1962. They had written 'Elis' on the rock in support of a politician, but days later their handiwork had been altered to read, 'Elvis'.
Mr Meredith was pleased the Elvis Rock had re-emerged. "Although Elis was changed to Elvis I'm pleased it's been reinstated as a Beacon of light on Plynlimon. The landmark is a symbol of our age and a reminder of our great hero Elvis the pelvis."
How the rock looked before it was destroyed
The replacement
- Family tree includes history with the 'King'
By CAROLE MOORE
(Daily News, March 25, 2005)
Elvis, who was from Mississippi, spent his early years in the same rural area around Tupelo where my father and his brothers and sisters were born. Both the Presleys and the Moores eventually moved to Memphis, but I'm still related to a good chunk of William Faulkner's state. My father, who was a couple of years older than Elvis, was the eldest boy on his side of the family. He had two older and one younger sister and a kid brother named Bill. The sisters, as good sisters will, have a lot of stories about my dad, who apparently spent much of his preschool years ripping his clothes off and running around au natural.
According to my Aunt Lynn, Dad's baby sister, he also decided one day to enter his cat in the county fair. So he did what he saw everyone else was doing with their animals and carried it to the creek to give it a bath. If nothing else, my father taught me to respect felines - especially their claws and sharp teeth.
There were a lot of interesting people on Dad's side of the family tree, but easily one of the most fascinating was a cousin of my father's who grew up with Elvis. Her name is Bobbie and she and Elvis were born about the same time. Bobbie's mother and Gladys Presley were friends and neighbors, and they often traded off on babysitting duties. Bobbie's mom would watch Elvis for Gladys and Gladys would return the favor by watching Bobbie.
Back then, people didn't have port-a-cribs. In fact, I remember distinctly being told that when my mother and father traveled with me as an infant, they would put me to bed in a dresser drawer. As a child I remember greeting this idea with mixed feelings. I believed they simply pushed the socks out of the way and plopped me in, shutting the drawer until the next morning. It wasn't until I reached adulthood that I discovered they took the drawer out of the dresser first.
When Bobbie and Elvis were babies, Bobbie's mother used to make what we called a "pallet" in the small living room of their home and put the diapered babies on it to sleep. Bobbie and the 'King of Rock and Roll' took many an afternoon nap on that floor. Bobbie and Elvis played together as kids, and when the Presleys moved to Memphis, they still maintained their friendship and saw one another on occasion. There was never anything between them but simple camaraderie, something I imagine Elvis probably treasured, especially when his career was at a peak and there were thousands and thousands of screaming females everywhere he went. But the two stayed in touch, and when Elvis was inducted into the Army, he decided to stop off and see Bobbie. Only one hitch in his plan: Bobbie had recently entered a convent, and was working on taking her vows as a nun. When Elvis showed up, the Mother Superior refused to let him talk to her.
As the years went by, Bobbie continued her career with the Catholic Church. Once she was sent to a conference of some sort where she wore civilian clothes and no one knew she was a nun. To break the ice, participants were asked to write down something about themselves that no one would ever guess by looking at them. Bobbie wrote: I am a nun and I have slept with Elvis. She won. Bobbie has been known to say that she used to worry about standing in line at the local grocery store and seeing the National Enquirer headline, "Nun Says: I Slept with Elvis!!!!"
The two families - the Moores and the Presleys - had more in common than simple geography, but my Dad's eldest sister, who is also the family matriarch, didn't like for people to know the connection. She always thought the Presleys a bit common. Why? As Aunt Margie likes to say, the Moores may have been poor, but they were poor and honest. And Vernon, of course, went to prison.
- Presley may be rock 'n' rolling over in his grave
By Elysa Gardner
(Yahoo! News / USA TODAY, March 25, 2005)
During high school choir practice, some friends and I would amuse ourselves by trying to imagine, and imitate, how Ethel Merman might have reinterpreted U2 songs. The point, of course, was that artistry celebrated in one style or genre doesn't necessarily translate to another. I suspect this joke, however obvious, would have been lost on the producers, casting agents and others involved in the new Elvis Presley homage All Shook Up (* out of four), the latest professional karaoke contest to masquerade as a Broadway musical.
Say what you will about Mamma Mia! and Good Vibrations, two other greatest-hits showcases designed to tap into the growing nostalgia and burgeoning bank accounts of aging pop fans. However off-putting their opportunism and lack of imagination, both at least aimed for musical authenticity, drawing on the expertise of insiders such as ABBA's Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson and Brian Wilson colleague Van Dyke Parks, and enlisting performers with a passing affinity for rock 'n' roll textures.
In contrast, most of the game young cast members of All Shook Up, which opened Thursday at the Palace Theatre, sing and act as if they just stepped off a Marvin Hamlisch tribute tour. There are some pretty and potent voices here, to be sure; but their approach to the material tends to range from painfully self-conscious to outright clueless. The calculated growls and mannered sneers that sometimes embellish golden oldies such as Hound Dog, Don't Be Cruel and That's All Right only add to the false, sterile feel of the numbers.
Joe DiPietro's book is even more tone-deaf. The plot, an unlikely and idiotic hybrid of Grease, Footloose and Twelfth Night, involves a tomboyish mechanic who falls for a guitar-wielding, hip-swiveling, motorcycle-riding drifter with long black sideburns. Tall, dark and hammy, Cheyenne Jackson plays the Elvis-like leading man with all the sincerity of a Chippendale dancer trying to bilk a drunk matron. Even at his most kitschy, Presley projected a certain earnestness; irony was the last quality you would associate with him. Yet like many contemporary shows that have nothing new or interesting to say, All Shook Up revels in winking jokes and self-reference - even as it makes lame attempts to touch on issues such as racism and homophobia. Cutting social satire is provided by way of a female mayor, played with cartoonish haughtiness by Alix Korey, who runs around lecturing everyone on moral decency.
Which Elvis fans, you may ask, will want to witness this strange marriage of snark and schlock? Some of the same ones, I suspect, who were drawn to Las Vegas toward the end of his life - not to catch a glimpse of his former glory, or even to mourn its loss, but to celebrate the same triumph of excess over substance that, come to think of it, has increasingly characterized Broadway musicals in the decades since. In one number, If I Can Dream, "angels" emerge on motorbikes suspended in midair by wires, sporting shiny suits and pouffy white wings. The person accompanying me remarked that it was a horrible thing to do to that song. And to all the others, he should have added.
- Review: Elvis Musical Is Suprising
By MICHAEL KUCHWARA
(Yahoo! News / Associated Press, March 24, 2005)
There may be life in the jukebox musical after all. The much-maligned genre that produced the highs of "Mamma Mia!" and the lows of "Good Vibrations" has strengthened the case for pop-song musical theater with a surprising "All Shook Up." This genial, thoroughly ingratiating show, which opened Thursday at Broadway's Palace Theatre, features songs made famous by that icon of rock 'n' roll, Elvis Presley. And it also celebrates Presley himself, using his persona as the model for the musical's lead character, a guitar-strumming, motorcycle-driving, hip-swiveling roustabout named Chad. What makes "All Shook Up" work so well is the show's cheerful, tongue-in-cheek sense of self. Book writer Joe DiPietro, one of the creators of the long-running off-Broadway revue "I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change," has concocted a goofy, often funny and sweet-tempered story that is an affectionate send-up not only of Shakespeare's "Twelfth Night," but all those cheesy movies Presley made during his mediocre film career. Remember such cinematic clinkers as "Harum Scarum," "Clambake" and "Speedway"? They make "All Shook Up" seem like "Long Day's Journey Into Night." ...
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