mid June 2007
- Oldies Night in Franklin Square
(Norwich Bulletin, June 15, 2007)
Rose City Renaissance and Falvey's of Norwich is sponsoring an Oldies Night on Friday, August 3. The evening will feature a look-alike contest for Elvis Presley, Marilyn Monroe, Little Richard and James Dean imitators with prizes awarded
Vendors are also welcome. The event will be held in Franklin Square.
For information, call 886-2730 or 303-5774.
- Elvis is in the building
By RICK de YAMPERT
(news-journalonline.com, June 15, 2007)
Psychics have told Daytona Beach resident Jeffery Golden he is the reincarnation of Elvis Presley's twin brother, who died at birth. Saturday, judges will tell Golden and 19 other Elvis impersonators whether they have the right stuff to win the "Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest." The contest at Destination Daytona in Ormond Beach is one of 23 preliminary competitions to be held internationally. Each preliminary location will send its winner to qualifying rounds and finals to be held Aug. 11 to 19 in Memphis during the 30th Anniversary Elvis Week.
You got questions about the Elvis artists competing in Ormond Beach? We got answers from three of them: 32-year-old Randy Filippi of Palm Coast, 39-year-old Jeffery Golden of Daytona Beach and 58-year-old Bill Passero of Ormond Beach. Filippi and Golden are full-time Elvis impersonators, each performing more than 100 shows per year. Passero is retired and performs a few times annually, usually at charity events.
Q. What was your initial inspiration to become an Elvis impersonator? Why do you do this?
Filippi: I was a musical theater major. After graduation, I opened my own theater company. I bought a karaoke system when I was 26, and "Blue Suede Shoes" was on the disc. I did the song at parties, and people enjoyed it so much that I learned a few more songs. Eventually people started offering me money to come to their parties and sing. The rest is history.
Golden: Being an entertainer since high school, people were always telling me I looked a lot like Elvis. I think he was in a different league from any entertainer I have ever seen or heard. No one before Elvis or today comes close to the excitement he brought to the stage. No one can fill his shoes but, man, how I would love to sing with his band in concert. That would be like winning the Super Bowl. I guess music was my way of getting girls, and it was something I loved to do. Now it is how I make my living, and I still love it today.
Passero: I started playing the guitar when I was about 10 years old. My mom only listened to Elvis, so that's what I played. I do this for the looks on the young and older people. They make me feel like I made their day.
Q. What's the most unusual, crazy or memorable time you've had while performing as Elvis?
Filippi: Every show I do seems to bring some new memorable moment. My loyal following has grown to over 100 people that show up just about every week (at performances at 8 p.m. Thursdays at European Village in Palm Coast, and 8 p.m. Saturdays at Mad Dog's on the River in Flagler Beach). I have a Flagler Mafia that leads me out at the beginning of each show. I treasure all the friendships I have made.
Golden: I was performing at an elementary school in Pensacola for about 900 students. Kids were screaming and crying like I was really Elvis Presley. Several would run to the stage and be taken back to their seats by a teacher. The teachers were almost in shock.Finally, six or eight teachers had to stand in front of the stage to keep everyone back. Things always get pretty wild, but never before or since have I seen anything like that.
Passero: When I did a private performance for a 10-year-old little girl named Emma in Chicago. She knew all the songs, and sang "Teddy Bear" with me. She made me feel like a star.
Q. If you could ask Elvis one question, what would it be?
Filippi: If you could live your life over, what would you do different?
Golden: Three different known psychics have told me I was Elvis' brother that died at birth and was reincarnated. I was regressed and I named several names (first and last) of people and events that there is no way I should have known they were related to Elvis. I believe that I am, and I would ask Elvis if he could tell me if this is really true.
Passero: Elvis, are you happy now being in heaven with your mom?
IF YOU GO
WHO: Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Contest
WHEN: 6 p.m. Saturday
WHERE: Destination Daytona, 1637 N. U.S. 1 (at the I-95 intersection), Ormond Beach
ADMISSION: Free
INFORMATION: (386) 671-7103
MORE ELVISES
"Almost Elvis," a 2001 documentary, claimed 35,000 people around the world are impersonating the King of Rock 'n' Roll. A quick troll of Web sites revealed Elvis wanna-bes from China, Japan, Thailand, Australia and Great Britain, plus "El Vez" from Mexico, the "Black Elvis" from Alabama, tribute artists from almost all 50 states, the lesbian "Elvis Herselvis" and other, ahem, "Elvira" (female Elvis impersonators).
- Stepping Back in Time
(WCBI TV-DT Columbus, Starkville and Tupelo News, June 14, 2007)
Julian Riley owns a big piece of Verona history, he's not just any Elvis Presley history buff he owns the building where Presley's parents were married and that's not all. "There were old buildings along the street here but they've all been destroyed or removed so this is all that's left," Riley said.
Riley bought the buildings that housed Lee County's first bank, hotel and the old Verona Town Hall all for the love of history. "I just can't stand the thoughts of tearing them down," he said.
Riley has a collection worthy of a museum. There's just about everything you can think of in these old buildings from antiques to owls. He said it's been a passion for years. ... Riley's proudest find is Ms. Ruth's Diner, a Verona favorite that's in the back of the old bank, decked out in historical memorabilia. Riley said he has big plans for all of the buildings.
People driving by may not know what these buildings are now but that may change. Riley said he hopes one day the buildings will be a tourist spot so other people can learn the same history lessons he has. Riley's love of history actually started a new legacy, the Verona Heritage Festival. The festival starts Saturday morning in downtown Verona and you can catch the re-enactment of the Vernon and Gladys Presley marriage.
- Elvis tribute act pays the cost in clothes
By TIM CAIN
(Herald & Review, June 13, 2007)
For Elvis Presley tribute performer Bill Cobb, the singing is easy the clothing is expensive. The Springfield-based Cobb performs at Mac's Tackle Box in Decatur Saturday. "The thing I''ve learned," Cobb said, "is Elvis is not a cheap venture to get into."
Cobb invested $2,600 in a jumpsuit to mimic the Las Vegas era of the singer, who died in 1977, when Cobb was 5. Cobb's custom-made shirts cost $100 to $150. Cobb has been investing all the money he makes from shows back into the shows, and is "hoping that by next year, I've put everything into it that I'll need to."
Cobb is playing 30 to 40 shows a year, and has traveled as far as Florida. He wants to do as much as he can while he can. He knows the shelf life of a tribute act "especially a performer who has died and maintains a fixed image in the public eye" is finite.
"I am a true Elvis fan," he said. "When it gets to the point that I can't do it any more, if I can't stay in shape, I'll quit. I might do it five more years." Cobb said he tries to add features to his act that he considers out of the ordinary for Elvis acts. "With my act, what I'm trying to do is come up with different things as far as songs," he said. "I go into who wrote it and who had a hit with it and where it landed in the charts for Elvis. "I try to do stuff people know, but there are a handful of songs I do that the common Elvis fan is going to hear and think, 'I didn't know he did that one.' What's nice about that is people will come see me again after a show and tell me they went out and hunted down Elvis CDs with the songs on them. It's keeping the memory of Elvis going, and that's what it's all about for me."
Cobb said his favorite Elvis song "changes depending on my mood," but he currently favors "Suspicious Minds," "My Way" and particularly "Unchained Melody."
WHO: Bill Cobb, Elvis Presley tribute performer
WHEN: 9 p.m. Saturday
WHERE: Mac's Tackle Box, 815 S. 22nd St., Decatur
TICKETS: $3 at the door
vON THE WEB: www.billcobbtcb.com
- King of the kings says thank you very much
(Gold Coast Bulletin, June 12, 2007)
As the sun finally set on Wintersun, Mark Anthony could safely say he was The King -- or at least, that he did a fine impersonation of him.
An Adelaide carpenter by day, Mr Anthony, 28, was declared overall winner of the South Pacific leg of the Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist contest during the final stages of Wintersun [Queensland, Australia] celebrations on Sunday night.
Festival organisers were also celebrating a win with the rock 'n' roll extravaganza injecting $20 million into the local economy and drawing 100,000 people. ... this year's 'King of Kings' Mr Anthony will be looking ahead to take his regal role to memphis, Tennessee, in August to battle it out with 23 of the world's top 'Elvii' as they contend for the title of Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist. ...
- Party Like the King: $2,000 Could Buy You Elvis Presley's Drugs
By DANIEL TAUB, Bloomberg News
(tennessean.com, June 12, 2007)
If you're the winning bidder for Lot 284 at a Beverly Hills, California, auction on Saturday, you could spend the rest of the weekend partying like the King. The item up for auction during Julien's Summer Sale at the Beverly Hilton hotel is an undated bottle for the antihistamine drug Naldecon, prescribed to singer Elvis Presley. It's estimated to go for $2,000 to $4,000. And the winner of the item gets a bonus: Remaining in the bottle are 12 assorted pills.
"The pills are very old," said Darren Julien, president of Julien's, the West Hollywood, California-based auction house running the sale. "You can tell. They're heavily discolored. You can take them to a lab, obviously, and figure out what they are."
The bottle of pills is one of more than a dozen Presley items on the block, along with movie posters, Marilyn Monroe photographs and other entertainment memorabilia. Presley died in 1977 at the age of 42, following years of heavy prescription-drug use.
The Naldecon was prescribed by George Nichopoulos, known as Dr. Nick, who began treating the King of Rock 'n' Roll in 1967 and was Presley's personal physician from 1970 until his death. Nichopoulos, who wrote 199 prescriptions for Presley in the eight months before the rock star died, had his medical license suspended in 1980 and lost it permanently in 1995. A 1980 criminal trial in which he was accused of abusing his license to prescribe drugs ended with an acquittal.
The pill bottle is one of the four Presley items in the June 16 auction from the collection of George Klein, who was the singer's friend starting in high school in Memphis, Tennessee, and served as a pallbearer at his funeral. Also being sold from Klein's collection is his 1953 Humes High School yearbook with the inscription, "Best of luck to a swell pal, Elvis."
- Today: Thousand of the best (4th item)
By Megan Doherty
(The Canberra Times, June 12, 2007, p. 14)
After a countdown that went from 9 am Friday to 4 pm yesterday - that's 79 hours on air - the team at 2CA finished their mammoth broadcast of their listeners' 1000 Best Songs of All Time. The top 10 were:
10. Yesterday, The Beatles
09. Angie, The Rolling Stones
08. Candle in the Wind, Elton John
07. Unchained Melody, The Righteous Brothers
06. Heartbreak Hotel, Elvis Presley
05. Hotel California, The Eagles
04. What a Wonderful World, Louis Armstrong
03. American Pie, Don MacLean
02. Stairway to Heaven, Led Zepplin
01. Imagine, John Lennon
Announcers Larry Appley, Hayden Miller, Gerry Nyein, Pete Davidson, Glen Paul, David Hohnke and Leighton Archer took turns in doing six-hour shifts to get the music out. ...
- Russian Judges Impressed By Area
By Amy Sherrill
(Times Record, June 11, 2007)
Seeing the Elvis Presley display at the Fort Smith Museum of History and learning about the history of Miss Lauraıs Visitor Center were the highlights Sunday for five judges visiting from Russia. Well, that is, behind meeting Fort Smith residents. ...
- Elvis collection bought with stolen cash fetches £102,000
By Damon Wakes
(The Scotsman, June 11, 2007)
A COLLECTION of rare Elvis Presley memorabilia amassed by a collector who stole more than £500,000 to pay for it yesterday raised more than £100,000 at auction. The huge collection included 8,000 records, concert tickets, costumes and posters. The sale, which raised £102,000, was ordered to try to recoup some of the money that Julie Wall, 46, stole in car park takings from North Kesteven District Council in Lincolnshire over nine years.
The cashier, who lived with her parents in Sleaford, Lincolnshire, until she was jailed in October 2005, has since been declared bankrupt. The most expensive item in the seven-and-a-half hour auction was a jukebox, which fetched £4,400. A banner that hung in the "King's" private tennis court raised £4,200. Another bidder at the Derby auction house paid £260 for a wig and set of sunglasses.
James Lewis, of the specialist auctioneer Bamfords, which hosted the sale, said: "She had a really incredible collection. She had every Elvis song released and dozens of different versions of each song as they were released for different countries."
Wall was jailed for three years after admitting stealing around £5,000 a month in loose change. She was caught after an internal audit showed £557,327 had gone missing over the years.
- A Curator Says Farewell: Final N.C. exhibition organized by former SECCA director features artists from 24 counties in the western part of the state
By Tom Patterson
(Winston Salem Journal, June 10, 2007)
Ron Platt has gotten around in the years since he left the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art. After serving as SECCA's curator for three years ending in mid-1999, he was curator of exhibitions at UNC Greensboro's Weatherspoon Art Museum and at the Asheville Art Museum, where he went in early 2005. He has curated memorable exhibits at all three institutions.
Late last year Platt left North Carolina for a new job as curator of modern and contemporary art at the Birmingham Museum of Art in Birmingham, Ala. Before he left, he organized his final show in the state, "Make It New," on view at the Asheville Art Museum through July 1. Platt borrowed the title from lines in an Ezra Pound poem that became a modernist dictum in the 20th century: "As the sun makes it new/Day by day make it new/Yet again make it new." For artists, those still serve as words to live by in the 21st century. The exhibition brings together recent works by 25 artists from 24 Western North Carolina counties. It's generally impressive and distinguished by a particularly strong selection of sculptures.
... Much else in the show merits close scrutiny and thought. Other highlights include Ralph Burns' photographs of Cuba and Elvis Presley's Graceland; Kevin Hogan's digital projections of multilayered shapes and patterns; Rorschach-format abstract paintings by Jimmy O'Neal; Anne Lemanski's wig-based sculptures and intricate, neosurrealist drawings by Kore Loy Wildrekinde-McWhirter. "Make It New" is scheduled to remain on view through July 1 at the Asheville Art Museum, 2 South Pack Square, in downtown Asheville. Three photographers represented in the show - Burns, Sebrell and Robin Dreyer - will give talks at the museum from 3 to 4:30 p.m. today. For more information, call 828-253-3227.
- No singing the blues
By Fred Love
(Gazette Online, June 10, 2007)
Several audience members wept as Gloria Lenhoff sang a selection from the operatic masterpiece "La Boheme." A few minutes later, with an accordion on her lap, she wowed the spectators again with her take on Elvis Presley's rockabilly classic, "Blue Suede Shoes."
Gloria, 52, a renowned classical singer with a repertoire of thousands of songs, has Williams syndrome, a rare genetic condition that causes severe mental disability. She has an IQ of 55, a crystal-clear voice and charismatic warmth - a combination that stunned a nearly full lecture hall at Coe College's Hickok Hall on Saturday. ...
- Susan Anton tours with songs and memories of the King
By Chris Page
(eastvalleytribune.com, June 10, 2007)
Actress Susan Anton remembers the time she met Elvis Presley. It was the early 1970s. She was 22, working in some little show in a hotel thatıs now gone, and Presley was doing a gig at the Las Vegas Hilton. They met backstage at a Tom Jones concert. ³He showed me some karate moves,² she says, chuckling.
Later, a small party of folks ended up at Presleyıs penthouse suite; there, he turned to Anton and said he had something to show her in his bedroom. ³I thought, 'Oh, here comes the cliche,ı ² she says. Turns out, he just wanted to read to her from Kahlil Gibranıs ³The Prophet.² It was a sweet moment: He sat on a footstool beside her and read like a child, his finger following the text. He signed the book, gave it to her and told her to have a blessed life.
Itıs an interesting anecdote because (a) itıs the King weıre talking about, and (b), these days Anton, 56, is the B-list star power in ³All Shook Up,² a Presley jukebox musical in which the largely 20-something cast is too young to have lived in the era of Elvis the Pelvis. The show comes Tuesday to Gammage Auditorium in Tempe for a five-day run.
... ³All Shook Up,² written by ³I Love You, Youıre Perfect, Now Change² playwright Joe DiPietro, wraps the catalog of Presleyıs hits (³Heartbreak Hotel,² ³Jailhouse Rock²) around a story thatıs one part ³Twelfth Night,² one part ³Footloose²: A young greaser with a motorcycle, pompadour and swiveling hip
- Tennessee: Life post-Elvis reaches 3 decades
(Charlotte Observer / New York Times, June 10, 2007)
August will mark the 30th anniversary of the death of Elvis Presley, an event that will be anything but ignored by the King's fans who flock to Memphis for Elvis Week. It's organized by Elvis Presley Enterprises and will include an Elvis tribute artist contest for the first time. Winners will be chosen during the eight-day festival (Aug. 11-19), which will also include an "Elvis: Midnight in Vegas" concert, a Graceland Scavenger Hunt and an Elvis Presley International Art Show.Other highlights will include the Elvis Expo -- 35,000 square feet of convention space in Memphis devoted to Elvis memorabilia -- and the yearly Candlelight Vigil, which always begins the night before the anniversary of Elvis' death, Aug. 16. Details: www.elvis.com.
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