late December
- Priscilla Presley to Celebrate Elvis' Birthday and the 70th Anniversary of Graceland
(Yahoo! Finance / (BUSINESS WIRE, December 30 2008)
WHEN/WHERE:
January 4, 2009 3:00 p.m.
The Elvis Birthday Grizzlies Game
The FEDEX Forum
January 8, 2009 9:30 a.m.
Elvis Presley Day Ceremony on the front steps of Graceland
The traditional ceremony with a special program hosted by Priscilla Presley, along with Graceland/EPE officials, will feature a birthday cake cutting and a proclamation of Elvis Presley Day.
The public can also view the proclamation event on elvis.com via a streaming LIVE online cam. For additional information on the many other activities available during the birthday celebration, visit elvis.com.
Graceland's 70th Anniversary Celebration/VIP Tour Exhibit will also kick off on the 8th with the birthday festivities. The colonial style mansion was built in 1939 by a prominent Memphis family that later sold the historic home and surrounding 13 acres to Elvis Presley in 1957. The 70th Anniversary exhibit, included as part of the VIP Tour package, features the original architectural drawings of Graceland, a signed check from Elvis for the down payment ($102,000) on the home, the deed to Graceland and a video presentation that includes memories from those who lived there, including the first family to call Graceland home.
Immediately following the proclamation, the media is invited to join Ms. Presley for the introduction of the newest member of the "Graceland Family." A 10-month-old colt named Bandit has been adopted and will join the other three horses at Graceland including Max, who Graceland rescued and adopted last year. Bandit was rescued by the Fayette County Animal Rescue in Rossville, TN and continues Elvis' love of horses and life of all kinds at Graceland.
- Review of 2008 - September
(Welwyn & Hatfield Times, December 27 2008)
...* ELVIS Presley was found alive and well in WGC [Welwyn Garden City]. Unfortunately for the conspiracy theorists and his many millions of fans, it was only a 'devil in disguise'. For it was Crap Elvis, aka Matt Hale from River View, who had earlier in the year set off across the planet travelling to world famous landmarks as a poor impersonation of the Memphis rocker. ...
- A-State alum recalls long association with Elvis
By MARK RANDALL
(trumanndemocrat.com, December 26 2008)
The Tau Kappa Epsilon fraternity at Arkansas State College was riding high on a wave of publicity in the fall of 1960. The fraternity had grabbed some positive headlines when chapter president Rick Husky, a journalism student from Wynne, succeeded in getting Ronald Reagan to drop by the fraternity house during his visit to Jonesboro.
Reagan was then the host of the popular television program General Electric Theater and part of his hosting duties included touring GE plants across the country. The future president had given a speech that day to the workers at the Jonesboro GE plant.
Husky contacted Reagan, who was a fellow TKE brother from his days at Eureka College , at his hotel and invited him to visit the Chapter. "As with most college campuses in those days, there was a healthy rivalry between Arkansas State fraternities to draw the spotlight in order to recruit new members, whether it be by trumpeting academic successes, or on the social side," Husky said in a recent e-mail. "I was surprised and happy when Reagan accepted. He was a very nice man who seemed totally sincere when he, indeed, did visit us. Our members took a number of photos with him which ran in the campus paper, the Jonesboro Sun and elsewhere. I'd venture to say that Mr. Reagan rang up a number of future votes that day, even though no one knew he was headed into politics."
Emboldened by the publicity Reagan's visit got, Husky dreamed up an idea to initiate someone famous as an honorary member.
Elvis Presley was the unanimous choice, but no one believed Husky could pull it off. "In fact, I remember several members pretty much laughing in my face," Husky said. Rising to the challenge, Husky came up with the idea of presenting Elvis with a Man of the Year Award for his considerable contributions to charity.
Presley had recently been discharged from the Army and had just arrived back at Graceland from Germany. Husky got the name of Elvis' secretary from a fan magazine and sent a letter to Elvis at Graceland in care of the secretary notifying him that TKE wished to present him with his award. But even he wasn't prepared for what followed when the world's biggest entertainer actually accepted their invitation to become an honorary TKE brother.
"Several days after mailing the letter to Graceland, I was shocked to receive a telegram at my dorm room," Husky said. "It was from Elvis' secretary stating he was happy to learn of his Man of the Year Award. I was invited to Graceland to present the award and to initiate Elvis at a night and time the following week."
There was just one problem though. While the idea of recognizing Elvis for his charity work was sincere, Husky had nothing to actually present to the entertainer because he had completely concocted the award as a publicity stunt. In a panic, Husky hurriedly dashed off some words to be engraved on a plaque for Elvis and through some arm twisting, was able to get a Jonesboro sporting goods store to prepare an impressive polished brass plaque.
Husky and TKE members Don DeArmen of Corning and Jeff Sheraer of Patterson, Mo., along with faculty member and fraternity advisor Robert Howe and photographer Charles Crowe, set out for Graceland on Oct. 24, 1960 in Husky's 1956 pink and white Ford for their meeting with Elvis.
... Husky said Elvis was very gracious and humble and told them that it was one of the nicest awards he had ever received. "I always wanted to go to college but never had the chance because I couldn't afford it," Husky quoted Elvis as saying in his news account for the campus newspaper The State Herald. "I'll always remember the fine manner in which Arkansas State students treated me back when I was starting out."
Bob Howe (left) a professor of radio at Arkansas State College and TKE president Rick Husky pose with Elvis Presley after presenting him with the fraternity's annual Distinguished Teke of the Year Award at Graceland.
(Photo courtesy of Elvis Presley Enterprises)
- Winners announced in Enterprise 'White Christmas' contest
(beaumontenterprise.com, December 26 2008)
Four lucky Southeast Texans won't have to dream of an iTunes gift card much longer.
William Seaman of Kountze; James Callas of Beaumont; Clint Tacker of Orange; and Doris Lindow of Beaumont correctly identified nine of our 10 artists in the Beaumont Enterprise's "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas" online contest. All four winners will receive a $15 iTunes gift card, courtesy of The Enterprise.
The contest consisted of 10 artists The Enterprise grouped together for one rendition of "White Christmas." The versions ranged from soothing to screeching, so participants had to listen close. For those of you who played, the correct artists in order are: Bing Crosby, John Denver, the Beach Boys, Connie Francis, Destiny's Child, Kenny Rogers, Elvis Presley, Twisted Sister, Michael Bolton and Frank Sinatra.
- Elvis Parent Company Calls Off Plans To Go Private
By BILL DRIES
(Memphis Daily News, December 26 2008)
The publicly traded company that owns 85 percent of Elvis Presley Enterprises has completely called off its attempt to go private. The notice from CKX Inc. cites "global economic difficulties and related credit freeze" as the reason it isn't pursuing a merger with 19X Inc. that had been planned for earlier this year.
The merger was to be a factor in a number of plans CKX has for the Elvis brand. That includes an estimated $250 million transformation of Graceland and the surrounding commercial area on Elvis Presley Boulevard between Brooks and Raines roads.
Neither CKX executives nor officials at Elvis Presley Enterprises have talked in much detail about those plans or the impact the credit crisis might have on them.
EPE has been buying up apartment complexes west of Graceland Plaza on the other side of Elvis Presley Boulevard from the mansion. Demolition work started on those complexes several weeks ago.
Off indefinitely
CKX president and chief executive officer Robert F.X. Sillerman, through the CKX 2007 annual report, has said the plans would include Elvis-themed attractions including restaurants, a new hotel and some type of convention center.
Sillerman, along with Simon Fuller, controls 19X. Fuller is best known as the creator of the "American Idol" television program. American Idol is among the properties of CKX, along with Elvis Presley Enterprises.
As 2008 began, Sillerman announced the plans for the merger and a target date of Oct. 31. In August, Sillerman, in a previously recorded message, told a gathering of Elvis fans in Memphis, "It would be irresponsible to say that the economic climate is not having an impact. I don't think it's going to slow down what we¹re doing,² he said in response to a written question about how the national economy would affect plans for Graceland and the area of Whitehaven surrounding the estate. "We have to modify to some extent those things that we're going to initiate at first."
He also told the group of Elvis fans that Graceland itself wouldn't be changed in an expansion. But he said the Graceland plaza where tourists board buses for the ride up the hill to tour the mansion might eventually move to the same side of Elvis Presley Boulevard as the mansion.
By September, Sillerman and Fuller announced they were terminating the 19X merger because of economic conditions, but also said they intended to pursue an "alternative transaction." With the Dec. 18 filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Sillerman and Fuller have said that they no longer intend to actively pursue an alternate transaction at this time for the acquisition of (CKX)."
- Grand Palais in Paris to Show Warhol's Wide World Next Year
(artdaily.com, December 24 2008)
In 1962, Andy Warhol painted the portraits of Marilyn Monroe and her rival Liz Taylor, reinterpreted the Mona Lisa and Elvis Presley. From 1967 until his death in 1987, he produced commissioned portraits of dozens of personalities, famous or obscure, creating a world fascinated by appearances, a vertiginous flattering mirror. He revived a neglected genre, applying new codes which deeply marked the history of portraiture.
Alongside film and rock stars (Brigitte Bardot, Jane Fonda, Mick Jagger, Sylvester Stallone), we find portraits of artists (Man Ray, David Hockney, Joseph Beuys, Keith Haring), collectors and art dealers (Dominique de Menil, Bruno Bischofberger, Ileana Sonnabend, Leo Castelli), politicians (Willy Brandt, Edward Kennedy), fashion designers (Yves Saint-Laurent, Sonia Rykiel, Helene Rochas), businessmen and jet-setters (Gianni Agnelli, Lee Radziwell, Princess Grace of Monaco, Gunther Sachs). Famous or less famous, they all glow with the aura of Warhol's genius.
... A selection from the thousand or so portraits that he painted from the early 1960s onwards is here presented by themes focusing on the key points in Warhol's work: Self Portraits, Screen Tests, Mao, Dollars, Disasters, The Last Supper..., which situate them in a retrospective view of his production. In 1979, the Whitney Museum exhibited about fifty of these paintings, but since then - despite the fact that many of them have become ³icons² - they have not been shown in a single-artist exhibition. With the aim of recreating the effect of the principle of repetition which Warhol had in mind when he painted them, the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais is presenting, for the first time, this large set of paintings which constitutes an unprecedented archive in the history of painting and photography.
- Young 'Elvis' wows Windsor
By BOB JOHNSON
(iolaregister.com, December 23 2008)
A grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich isn't the favorite after-school snack for Brady Wiggan, a first-grader at Lincoln Elementary School, but that's about the only thing about Elvis Presley he doesn't embrace.
Brady, 6-year-old son of Iolans Matt and Chi Wiggan, saw an Elvis impersonator at last summer's anniversary celebration of the 2007 flood and was hooked. Since then he has watched most of the movies that Presley made, some several times, and listens to hardly anything but music Presley made famous.
His wish for Christmas? A guitar and lessons so he can develop a more thorough Elvis impersonation of his own. Brady already knows the moves Presley introduced to the nation on "The Ed Sullivan Show" in 1956 and has put together a show of his own, dancing - maybe gyrating is a better description - to Presley¹s music.
He entertained residents at Windsor Place Monday during their evening meal. Many were so delighted they stopped eating while he performed and one got up to dance with the youngster. "He does it for fun," Chi Wiggan said of her son's fascination and imitation of Presley. "He dressed in one of his Elvis costumes for Halloween and won a prize." And, in addition to a guitar and lessons for Christmas, "he'd like to go to Graceland (in Memphis) to see where Elvis lived."
Brady's fascination with the "King of Rock 'n' Roll" isn't lost on his young friends. He's known as "Elvis" around Lincoln Elementary School. He has the clothes and he has the moves, but he's going to have to wait on maturation for the sideburns. Mom took care of that last night with a little grease paint.
Register/Bob Johnson
Brady Wiggan performed as Elvis Presley at Windsor Place Monday evening. Among those taking in the show was Margarette Henkle.
- 1968: The Return of the King
By Randy Ray
(jambands.com, December 23 2008)
It was Elvis Presley, the white boy with the black beat and the hitch in his voice, who put the bop in the bop-da-bop-da-bop.
- The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage, Todd Gitlin
As the majestic swirl of Election Day 2008 continues to float into the air, reminding each of us that perhaps the American Dream is still alive and well, I couldn't help but think of how far we had progressed as a nation in the 40 years since Our Year of the King.
1968 was a year that saw support for the Vietnam War begin to dramatically decline after the My Lai Massacre in which insurgent American troops murdered hundreds of South Vietnamese civilians, a disastrous showdown between hippies, liberals, journalists and the Chicago police force at the Democratic National Convention, and two tragic assassinations that seared and rocked America and the Great Leftist Movement - civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr., and New York senator Robert F. Kennedy.
Oh, but what a year for a certain American artform amidst the international turmoil...
1968 was a magnificent year for music as the Beatles and Rolling Stones towered over the rock 'n' roll world in the last year of their rein before Led Zeppelin would permanently alter the royal rock landscape in January 1969. Cream peaked and said goodbye, short-circuiting a band and a group of musicians who would flounder in diverse and mixed success over the next 40 years. The Band said hello with the slate-cleaning Americana classic, Music from Big Pink, Motown thrived, Stax/Volt triumphed, Aretha Franklin continued her rein as the Queen of Soul, winning a Grammy for "Respect," and releasing one of her strongest albums to date, Lady Soul, while an American in an English trio, Jimi Hendrix, was quickly becoming the greatest guitarist on the planet.
All of the above litany of musical highlights pale in comparison to a single televised appearance by a musician who hadn't played a live performance in seven long, mediocre-movie filled years, dwarfed by his past, and cowering on the edge of a mighty downfall.
The Elvis Presley "Comeback Special" marked its 40th anniversary on December 3, 2008. Presley was a gifted improviser, who had the ability to sing like an opera singer, quip like a comedian, and slash-and-pluck the guitar along with a real raunchy rock 'n''roll band. He was, and still is in most cultural quarters, called the King for a very good reason, and one simple look at this television special explains why.
The program was initially commissioned by Presley's manager, Colonel Tom Parker as a chance to get the King on T.V. singing holiday songs for Christmas. Parker, not known for his artistic innovation say...post-Presley's discovery in the mid-1950s, thought that America wanted to see Elvis Presley delivering Christmas music for the masses, and then he¹d move on to the next career move for his artist. Unfortunately, Presley had been churning out one ill-conceived acting role after another for most of the 1960s, and had lost the plot of his career. Not helping the matter was the fact that the twin towers of the musical renaissance during that turbulent decade - the Beatles and Bob Dylan - both acknowledged Presley as a primary influence on their careers, but it seemed to be completely rendered in a past tense tone as if the living legend had already retired.
Like the Beat King, hitchhiker, novelist, poet, alcoholic, and disturbed shit-disturber, Jack Kerouac, Elvis just didn't matter anymore in a world filled with long hair, hard drugs, free love, 10-minute Grateful Dead feedback freak outs, and a film by Stanley Kubrick who consolidated all of his audio and visual strengths, took cinema, gave it an enema, dosed it with LSD, and warped many a noodle with the transcendent and deeply metaphysical weirdness of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
And so we come to the third evening in the last month of the year which almost broke the back of a modern nation that a white kid helped build while playing black music. Elvis Presley was at a crossroads of his own device, and only he could find a way out of this madness. And yetŠhe had help out of this dilemma - becoming relevant again within a war-ravished culture that had passed him by, found new gods to worship- from the unlikeliest of sources. Producer/director Steve Binder ignored the holiday premise, and focused on what made Presley the King in the first place: charisma, songs, and That Voice. Sure, Elvis sang a few holiday songs, but these cuts were buried in the avalanche of great material that covered the length and breadth of a once vital Presley oeuvre.
Binder noticed Elvis Presley's dynamic interplay with musicians during rehearsal, and came up with a landmark idea that would resonate with the artist and his audience during the icon's first television special. This moment of epiphany prompted Binder to get Presley back together with his original classic 1950s/pre-Army/pre-movie career malaise band, which included Scotty Moore on guitar, and D.J. Fontana on drums.
The "Black Leather Sit-Down" show, so-called because Presley was clothed in black leather jacket, pants and boots that made him look like he not only invented rock 'n' roll, but he WAS rock 'n' roll. Gone was the smarmy dialogue in some hokey Hollywood film. Gone was the residue of what he was, and could have been. In its place was the Return of the King as he sat down with his old band members, singing and riffing through song after song with an energy rarely found on television, let alone a small studio environment filled to the brim with an adoring audience. The musicians played these songs with an ease and hipness that belied the fact that Presley needed this performance, needed this night to happen. Presley, Moore, Fontana, and Elvis friends and entourage members, Charlie Hodge, Alan Fortas, and former Elvis movie stand-in Lance LeGault played great music, and a legend returned to his place in the ethereal history books.
This moment could have been the height of cynical cheesiness. Instead, the man grabbed his chance with an overwhelming confidence. Here was "the white boy with the black beat and the hitch in his voice, who put the bop in the bop-da-bop-da-bop." Here was Elvis Presley in all his glory as the group tore into an incendiary set of unequaled rock 'n' roll classics, sitting down, and improvising their way through the transcendent set: "That's All Right," "Heartbreak Hotel," "Love Me," "Blue Suede Shoes," "Lawdy Miss Clawdy," and "Baby, What You Want Me to Do," a Jimmy Reed song featuring a performance that served as formidable proof to anyone doubting that Elvis could play the guitar. He could on this evening, while borrowing Scotty Moore's electric, and reminding millions of that fact while remaining loose, relaxed, and filled with a swagger and a look that anything could happen at any time, and it was all going to be FANTASTIC.
Binder showcased Presley in a variety of settings including the "if you¹re looking for Trouble, you've come to the right place/Guitar Man" show opener, a choreographed gospel production, the "Black Leather Stand-up Show" where Presley ripped through his songs, solo and in command of his material like "Jailhouse Rock" and "Don't Be Cruel," the flirtatious bordello sequence which wasn't aired due to sponsor trepitude, but saw the light of day on the 2004 'all-takes' 3-DVD version of Elvis: '68 Comeback Special, and the closing "If I Can Dream," which juxtaposed in a wonderful way with the smoldering leather-clad Presley sequences as the man was dressed in an all-white suit with a red tie, singing solo in front of that now famous 'ELVIS' logo bathed in right light bulbs.
After the television program, Presley's musical career would be reinvigorated for a time, including new singles and tours, long Las Vegas stints, and unwieldy entourages filled with "Yes" men carrying bags of pills for the beleaguered and troubled superstar, and a worldwide broadcast from Hawaii that would somehow miss what made him special. Sadly, the original Guitar Man would die eight years after this groundbreaking special. His career would forever be intertwined with the 1950s and feelings of nostalgia about a bygone era of equality, happiness, and peace and prosperity that never really happened. In truth, the greatness of the American Dream for all citizens only began to be truly tapped as something that held a bit of promise on November 4, 2008, but in 1968, one had a hope, a feeling, a dream that one day that idea would happen. Whether or not that idealism was high up on Elvis¹ agenda is unknown, but to condemn the man for being the 'white guy who brought black music' to a world audience is, perhaps, short-sighted.
Indeed, the 'Little Theatre' sequences with Elvis and his original guitarist and drummer, in a mad yet brilliant bit of improvisatory inspiration by producer/director Steve Binder, negating the anti-creative streak of Presley manager and albatross Colonel Tom Parker, would forever cement the Memphis croone's musical reputation. In a way, Elvis had something to prove, his own musical debt to repay after years of squandered talent. Regardless of the occasional bloated mediocrity to follow, 40 years ago on December 3, 1968, in the "Little Theatre" of musical immortality, the "Black Leather Sit-Down Show" was where Presley and his old band mates found their muse again, and carried the King from Hollywood and back to his rightful place - the throne of rock 'n' roll.
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