Fever (also known as pyrexia) is a common medical sign characterized by an elevation of temperature above the normal range of due to an increase in the body temperature regulatory set-point. This increase in set-point triggers increased muscle tone and shivering.

As a person's temperature increases, there is, in general, a feeling of cold despite an increasing body temperature. Once the new temperature is reached, there is a feeling of warmth. A fever can be caused by many different conditions ranging from benign to potentially serious. There are arguments for and against the usefulness of fever, and the issue is controversial. With the exception of very high temperatures, treatment to reduce fever is often not necessary; however, antipyretic medications can be effective at lowering the temperature, which may improve the affected person's comfort.

Fever differs from uncontrolled hyperthermia, in that hyperthermia is an increase in body temperature over the body's thermoregulatory set-point, due to excessive heat production and/or insufficient thermoregulation.

Definition

A wide range for normal temperatures has been found. Fever is generally agreed to be present if the elevated temperature is caused by a raised set point and: Temperature in the anus (rectum/rectal) is at or over Temperature in the mouth (oral) is at or over Temperature under the arm (axillary) or in the ear (otic) is at or over

In healthy adult men and women, the range of normal, healthy temperatures for oral temperature is , for rectal it is , for tympanic membrane (the ear drum) it is , and for axillary (the armpit) it is . Harrison's textbook of internal medicine defines a fever as a morning temperature of >37.2°C (>98.9°F) or an evening temperature of >37.7°C (>99.9°F) with the normal daily temperature variation is typically 0.5°C (0.9°F).

Normal body temperatures vary depending on many factors, including age, sex, time of day, ambient temperature, activity level, and more. A raised temperature is not always a fever. For example, the temperature of a healthy person rises when he or she exercises, but this is not considered a fever, as the set-point is normal. On the other hand, a "normal" temperature may be a fever, if it is unusually high for that person. For example, medically frail elderly people have a decreased ability to generate body heat, so a "normal" temperature of may represent a clinically significant fever.

Types

[[File:Febbre.gif|thumb|right|Performance of the various types of fever a) Fever continues b) Fever continues to abrupt onset and remission c) Fever remittent d) Intermittent fever e) Undulant fever f) Relapsing fever]] The pattern of temperature changes may occasionally hint at the diagnosis:

Continuous fever: Temperature remains above normal throughout the day and does not fluctuate more than in 24 hours, ''e.g.'' lobar pneumonia, typhoid, urinary tract infection, brucellosis, or typhus. Typhoid fever may show a specific fever pattern (''Wunderlich curve'' of typhoid fever), with a slow stepwise increase and a high plateau. (Drops due to fever-reducing drugs are excluded.) Intermittent fever: The temperature elevation is present only for a certain period, later cycling back to normal, ''e.g.'' malaria, kala-azar, pyaemia, or septicemia. Following are its types

*Quotidian fever, with a periodicity of 24 hours, typical of ''Plasmodium falciparum''

*Tertian fever (48 hour periodicity), typical of ''Plasmodium vivax'' and ''Plasmodium ovale''

*Quartan fever (72 hour periodicity), typical of ''Plasmodium malariae''.

Remittent fever: Temperature remains above normal throughout the day and fluctuates more than in 24 hours, ''e.g.'', infective endocarditis. Pel-Ebstein fever: A specific kind of fever associated with Hodgkin's lymphoma, being high for one week and low for the next week and so on. However, there is some debate as to whether this pattern truly exists.

A neutropenic fever, also called febrile neutropenia, is a fever in the absence of normal immune system function. Because of the lack of infection-fighting neutrophils, a bacterial infection can spread rapidly; this fever is, therefore, usually considered to require urgent medical attention. This kind of fever is more commonly seen in people receiving immune-suppressing chemotherapy than in apparently healthy people.

''Febricula'' is an old term for a low-grade fever, especially if the cause is unknown, no other symptoms are present, and the patient recovers fully in less than a week.

Hyperpyrexia

Hyperpyrexia is a fever with an extreme elevation of body temperature greater than or equal to . Such a high temperature is considered a medical emergency as it may indicate a serious underlying condition or lead to significant side effects. The most common cause is an intracranial hemorrhage. Other possible causes include sepsis, Kawasaki syndrome, neuroleptic malignant syndrome, drug effects, serotonin syndrome, and thyroid storm. Infections are the most common cause of fevers, however as the temperature rises other causes become more common. Infections commonly associated with hyperpyrexia include: roseola, rubeola and enteroviral infections. Immediate aggressive cooling to less than has been found to improve survival. Hyperpyrexia differs from hyperthermia in that in hyperpyrexia the body's temperature regulation mechanism sets the body temperature above the normal temperature, then generates heat to achieve this temperature, while in hyperthermia the body temperature rises above its set point.

Hyperthermia

Hyperthermia is an example of a high temperature that is not a fever. It occurs from a number of causes including heatstroke, neuroleptic malignant syndrome, malignant hyperthermia, stimulants such as amphetamines and cocaine, idiosyncratic drug reactions, and serotonin syndrome.

Signs and symptoms

thumb|Michael Peter Ancher, "The Sick Girl", 1882, Statens Museum for Kunst A fever is usually accompanied by sickness behavior, which consists of lethargy, depression, anorexia, sleepiness, hyperalgesia, and the inability to concentrate.

Differential diagnosis

Fever is a common symptom of many medical conditions:

Infectious disease, ''e.g.'', influenza, HIV, malaria, infectious mononucleosis, or gastroenteritis

Various skin inflammations, ''e.g.'', boils, or abscess

Immunological diseases, ''e.g.'', lupus erythematosus, sarcoidosis, inflammatory bowel diseases, Kawasaki disease

Tissue destruction, which can occur in hemolysis, surgery, infarction, crush syndrome, rhabdomyolysis, cerebral hemorrhage, etc.

Reaction to incompatible blood products

Cancers, most commonly kidney cancer and leukemia and lymphomas

Metabolic disorders, ''e.g.'', gout or porphyria

Thrombo-embolic processes, ''e.g.'', pulmonary embolism or deep venous thrombosis

Persistent fever that cannot be explained after repeated routine clinical inquiries is called fever of unknown origin.

Pathophysiology

Temperature is ultimately regulated in the hypothalamus. A trigger of the fever, called a pyrogen, causes a release of prostaglandin E2 (PGE2). PGE2 then in turn acts on the hypothalamus, which generates a systemic response back to the rest of the body, causing heat-creating effects to match a new temperature level.

In many respects, the hypothalamus works like a thermostat. When the set point is raised, the body increases its temperature through both active generation of heat and retaining heat. Vasoconstriction both reduces heat loss through the skin and causes the person to feel cold. If these measures are insufficient to make the blood temperature in the brain match the new setting in the hypothalamus, then shivering begins in order to use muscle movements to produce more heat. When the fever stops, and the hypothalamic setting is set lower; the reverse of these processes (vasodilation, end of shivering and nonshivering heat production) and sweating are used to cool the body to the new, lower setting.

This contrasts with hyperthermia, in which the normal setting remains, and the body overheats through undesirable retention of excess heat or over-production of heat. Hyperthermia is usually the result of an excessively hot environment (heat stroke) or an adverse reaction to drugs. Fever can be differentiated from hyperthermia by the circumstances surrounding it and its response to anti-pyretic medications.

Pyrogens

A pyrogen is a substance that induces fever. These can be either internal (endogenous) or external (exogenous) to the body. The bacterial substance lipopolysaccharide (LPS), present in the cell wall of some bacteria, is an example of an exogenous pyrogen. Pyrogenicity can vary: In extreme examples, some bacterial pyrogens known as superantigens can cause rapid and dangerous fevers. Depyrogenation may be achieved through filtration, distillation, chromatography, or inactivation.

;Endogenous In essence, all endogenous pyrogens are cytokines, molecules that are a part of the innate immune system. They are produced by phagocytic cells and cause the increase in the thermoregulatory set-point in the hypothalamus. Major endogenous pyrogens are interleukin 1 (α and β), interleukin 6 (IL-6) and tumor necrosis factor-alpha. Minor endogenous pyrogens include interleukin-8, tumor necrosis factor-α, tumor necrosis factor-β, macrophage inflammatory protein-α and macrophage inflammatory protein-β as well as interferon-α, interferon-β, and interferon-γ.

These cytokine factors are released into general circulation, where they migrate to the circumventricular organs of the brain due to easier absorption caused by the blood-brain barrier's reduced filtration action there. The cytokine factors then bind with endothelial receptors on vessel walls, or interact with local microglial cells. When these cytokine factors bind, the arachidonic acid pathway is then activated.

;Exogenous One model for the mechanism of fever caused by exogenous pyrogens includes LPS, which is a cell wall component of gram-negative bacteria. An immunological protein called lipopolysaccharide-binding protein (LBP) binds to LPS. The LBP–LPS complex then binds to the CD14 receptor of a nearby macrophage. This binding results in the synthesis and release of various endogenous cytokine factors, such as interleukin 1 (IL-1), interleukin 6 (IL-6), and the tumor necrosis factor-alpha. In other words, exogenous factors cause release of endogenous factors, which, in turn, activate the arachidonic acid pathway.

PGE2 release

PGE2 release comes from the arachidonic acid pathway. This pathway (as it relates to fever), is mediated by the enzymes phospholipase A2 (PLA2), cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2), and prostaglandin E2 synthase. These enzymes ultimately mediate the synthesis and release of PGE2.

PGE2 is the ultimate mediator of the febrile response. The set-point temperature of the body will remain elevated until PGE2 is no longer present. PGE2 acts on neurons in the preoptic area (POA) through the prostaglandin E receptor 3 (EP3). EP3-expressing neurons in the POA innervate the dorsomedial hypothalamus (DMH), the rostral raphe pallidus nucleus in the medulla oblongata (rRPa), and the paraventricular nucleus (PVN) of the hypothalamus . Fever signals sent to the DMH and rRPa lead to stimulation of the sympathetic output system, which evokes non-shivering thermogenesis to produce body heat and skin vasoconstriction to decrease heat loss from the body surface. It is presumed that the innervation from the POA to the PVN mediates the neuroendocrine effects of fever through the pathway involving pituitary gland and various endocrine organs.

Hypothalamus

The brain ultimately orchestrates heat effector mechanisms via the autonomic nervous system. These may be:

Increased heat production by increased muscle tone, shivering and hormones like epinephrine

Prevention of heat loss, such as vasoconstriction.

In infants, the autonomic nervous system may also activate brown adipose tissue to produce heat (non-exercise-associated thermogenesis, also known as non-shivering thermogenesis). Increased heart rate and vasoconstriction contribute to increased blood pressure in fever.

Usefulness

There are arguments for and against the usefulness of fever, and the issue is controversial. There are studies using warm-blooded vertebrates and humans ''in vivo'', with some suggesting that they recover more rapidly from infections or critical illness due to fever. A Finnish study suggested reduced mortality in bacterial infections when fever was present.

In theory, fever can aid in host defense. There are certainly some important immunological reactions that are sped up by temperature, and some pathogens with strict temperature preferences could be hindered.

Research has demonstrated that fever assists the healing process in several important ways:

Increased mobility of leukocytes

Enhanced leukocytes phagocytosis

Endotoxin effects decreased

Increased proliferation of T cells

Management

Fever should not necessarily be treated. Most people recover without specific medical attention. Although it is unpleasant, fever rarely rises to a dangerous level even if untreated. Damage to the brain generally does not occur until temperatures reach 42 °C (107.6 °F), and it is rare for an untreated fever to exceed . Some limited evidence supports sponging or bathing feverish children with tepid water. The use of a fan or air conditioning may somewhat reduce the temperature and increase comfort. If the temperature reaches the extremely high level of hyperpyrexia, aggressive cooling is required. In general, people are advised to keep adequately hydrated. Whether increased fluid intake improves symptoms or shortens respiratory illnesses such as the common cold is not known.

Medications

The antipyretic ibuprofen is effective in reducing fevers in children. It is more effective than acetaminophen (paracetamol) in children. Ibuprofen and acetaminophen may be safely used together in children with fevers. The efficacy of acetaminophen by itself in children with fevers has been questioned. Ibuprofen is also superior to aspirin in children with fevers. Additionally, aspirin is not recommended in children and young adults (those under the age of 16 or 19 depending on the country) due to the risk of Reye's syndrome.

Epidemiology

About 5% of people who go to an emergency room have a fever.

Society and culture

Fever phobia

Fever phobia is the name given by medical experts to parents' misconceptions about fever in their children. Among them, many parents incorrectly believe that fever is a disease rather than a medical sign, that even low fevers are harmful, and that any temperature even briefly or slightly above the oversimplified "normal" number marked on a thermometer is a clinically significant fever. They are also afraid of harmless side effects like febrile seizures and dramatically overestimate the likelihood of permanent damage from typical fevers. The underlying problem, according to professor of pediatrics Barton D. Schmitt, is "as parents we tend to suspect that our children’s brains may melt".

As a result of these misconceptions parents are anxious, give the child fever-reducing medicine when the temperature is technically normal or only slightly elevated, and interfere with the child's sleep to give the child more medicine.

Etymology

Pyrexia is from the Greek ''pyr'' meaning ''fire''. Febrile is from the Latin word ''febris'', meaning ''fever'', and archaically known as ''ague''.

In other animals

Fever is an important feature for the diagnosis of disease in domestic animals. The body temperature of animals, which is taken rectally, is different from one species to another. For example, a horse is said to have a fever above ().

In species that allow the body to have a wide range of "normal" temperatures, such as camels, it is sometimes difficult to determine a febrile stage.

References

Further reading

Rhoades, R. and Pflanzer, R. Human physiology, third edition, chapter 27 ''Regulation of body temperature'', p. 820 ''Clinical focus: pathogenesis of fever''. ISBN 0-03-005159-2

External links

What to do if your child has a fever from Seattle Children's Hospital

Fever and Taking Your Child's Temperature

US National Institute of Health factsheet

Drugs most commonly associated with the adverse event Pyrexia (Fever) as reported the FDA

Category:Fever

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name	Peggy Lee
background	solo_singer
birth name	Norma Deloris Egstrom
birth date	May 26, 1920
birth place	Jamestown, North Dakota
death date	January 21, 2002
death place	Bel Air, Los Angeles, California
genre	Traditional pop, jazz
occupation	Singer, actress, songwriter
years active	1941–2000
label	Decca Records Capitol Records
notable instruments	}}

Peggy Lee (May 26, 1920 – January 21, 2002) was an American jazz and popular music singer, songwriter, composer, and actress in a career spanning six decades. From her beginning as a vocalist on local radio to singing with Benny Goodman's big band, she forged a sophisticated persona, evolving into a multi-faceted artist and performer. She wrote music for films, acted, and created conceptual record albums—encompassing poetry, jazz, chamber pop, and art songs.

Early life

Lee was born Norma Deloris Egstrom in Jamestown, North Dakota, the seventh of eight children of Marvin Olof Egstrom, a station agent for the Midland Continental Railroad, and his wife Selma Amelia (Anderson) Egstrom. Her mother died when Lee was just four years old. Her father was Swedish American and her mother was Norwegian American.

Lee first sang professionally over KOVC radio in Valley City, North Dakota. She later had her own series on a radio show sponsored by a local restaurant that paid her a "salary" in food. Both during and after her high school years, Lee sang for paltry sums on local radio stations. Radio personality Ken Kennedy, of WDAY in Fargo, North Dakota (the most widely heard station in North Dakota), changed her name from Norma to Peggy Lee. Thereafter, Lee left home and traveled to Los Angeles at the age of 17.

She returned to North Dakota for a tonsillectomy, and later made her way to Chicago for a gig at The Buttery Room, a nightclub in the Ambassador Hotel East. There, she was noticed by bandleader Benny Goodman. According to Lee, "Benny's then-fiancée, Lady Alice Duckworth, came into The Buttery, and she was very impressed. So the next evening she brought Benny in, because they were looking for a replacement for Helen Forrest. And although I didn't know, I was it. He was looking at me strangely, I thought, but it was just his preoccupied way of looking. I thought that he didn't like me at first, but it just was that he was preoccupied with what he was hearing." She joined his band in 1941 and stayed for two years.

Recording career

In 1942 Lee had her first #1 hit, "Somebody Else Is Taking My Place", followed by 1943's "Why Don't You Do Right?" (originally sung by Lil Green), which sold over a million copies and made her famous. She sang with Goodman's orchestra in two 1943 films, ''Stage Door Canteen'' and ''The Powers Girl''.

In March 1943 Lee married Dave Barbour, a guitarist in Goodman's band. Peggy said, "David joined Benny's band and there was a ruling that no one should fraternize with the girl singer. But I fell in love with David the first time I heard him play, and so I married him. Benny then fired David, so I quit, too. Benny and I made up, although David didn't play with him anymore. Benny stuck to his rule. I think that's not too bad a rule, but you can't help falling in love with somebody."

When Lee and Barbour left the band, the idea was that he would work in the studios and she would keep house and raise their daughter, Nicki. But she drifted back to songwriting and occasional recording sessions for the fledgling Capitol Records in 1947, for whom she produced a long string of hits, many of them with lyrics and music by Lee and Barbour, including "I Don't Know Enough About You" and "It's a Good Day" (1948). With the release of the US #1-selling record of 1948, "Mañana", her "retirement" was over.

In 1948 Lee joined Perry Como and Jo Stafford as a rotating host of the NBC Radio musical program ''Chesterfield Supper Club''. She was also a regular on NBC's ''Jimmy Durante Show''.

She left Capitol for a few years in the early 1950s, but returned in 1953. She is most famous for her cover version of the Little Willie John hit "Fever" written by Eddie Cooley and John Davenport, to which she added her own, uncopyrighted lyrics ("Romeo loved Juliet," "Captain Smith and Pocahontas") and her rendition of Leiber and Stoller's "Is That All There Is?". Her relationship with the Capitol label spanned almost three decades, aside from her brief but artistically rich detour (1952–1956) at Decca Records, where in 1956 she recorded one of her most acclaimed albums, ''Black Coffee''. While recording for Decca, Lee had hit singles with the songs ''Lover'' and ''Mister Wonderful''.

Lee is today internationally recognized for her signature song "Fever". She had a string of successful albums and top 10 hits in three consecutive decades. She is regarded as one of the most influential jazz vocalists of all time, being cited as a mentor to diverse artists such as Judy Garland, Frank Sinatra, Paul McCartney, Bette Midler, Madonna, and Dusty Springfield. Lee was also an accomplished actress.

In her 60-year-long career, Peggy was the recipient of three Grammy Awards (including the Lifetime Achievement Award), an Academy Award nomination, The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) Award, the President's Award, the Ella Award for Lifetime Achievement, and the Living Legacy Award from the Women's International Center. In 1999 Lee was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Songwriting

Lee was a successful songwriter, with songs from the Disney movie ''Lady and the Tramp'', for which she also supplied the singing and speaking voices of four characters. Her collaborators included Laurindo Almeida, Harold Arlen, Sonny Burke, Cy Coleman, Duke Ellington, Dave Grusin, Quincy Jones, Francis Lai, Jack Marshall, Johnny Mandel, Marian McPartland, Willard Robison, Lalo Schifrin and Victor Young.

She wrote the lyrics for:

"I Don't Know Enough About You"

"It's A Good Day", composed by Dave Barbour

"I'm Gonna Go Fishin'", composed with Duke Ellington

"The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter"

"Mañana (Is Soon Enough for Me)"

"Bless You (For The Good That's In You)", composed with Mel Tormé

"What More Can a Woman Do?"

"Don't Be Mean to Baby"

"New York City Ghost", composed with Victor Young

"You Was Right, Baby"

"Just an Old Love of Mine"

"Everything's Movin' Too Fast"

"The Shining Sea"

"He's A Tramp"

"The Siamese Cat Song"

"There Will Be Another Spring"

"Johnny Guitar", composed with Victor Young

"Sans Souci", composed with Sonny Burke

"So What's New?"

"Don't Smoke in Bed"

"I Love Being Here With You"

"Happy With the Blues" with Harold Arlen

"Where Can I Go Without You?"

"Things Are Swingin'"

"Then Was Then" with Cy Coleman

Her first published song was in 1941, "Little Fool". "What More Can a Woman Do?" was recorded by Sarah Vaughan with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. "Mañana (Is Soon Enough for Me)" was no.1 for 9 weeks on the Billboard singles chart in 1948, from the week of March 13 to May 8.

Lee was a mainstay of Capitol Records when rock'n'roll came onto the American music scene. She was among the first of the "old guard" to recognize this new genre, as seen by her recording music from The Beatles, Randy Newman, Carole King, James Taylor and other up-and-coming songwriters. From 1957 until her final disc for the company in 1972, she produced a steady stream of two or three albums per year which usually included standards (often arranged quite different from the original), her own compositions, and material from young artists.

Acting career

Lee starred and sang in the hit films ''The Jazz Singer,'' Disney's ''Lady and the Tramp'', and ''Pete Kelly's Blues'', for which she received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress.

In 1952 Lee played opposite Danny Thomas in a remake of the early Al Jolson film, ''The Jazz Singer''. In 1955 she played an alcoholic blues singer in ''Pete Kelly's Blues'', for which she received an Academy Awards nomination. After years of poor health, Lee died of complications from diabetes and a heart attack at age 81. Her body was buried in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles' Westwood, Los Angeles, California neighborhood. On her marker in a garden setting is inscribed, "Music is my life's breath."

Legacy

Academy Awards memorial omission

She was not featured in the memorial tribute during the 2002 Academy Awards ceremony. When her family requested she be featured in the following year's ceremony, the Academy stated they did not honor requests and Lee was omitted because her contribution to film and her legacy were not deemed significant enough, although she had been nominated for a Best Supporting Actress for her performance in ''Pete Kelly's Blues''. Her family pointed out that, although she had been omitted, R&B; singer/actress Aaliyah, who died a few months earlier, was included though having been in only one moderately successful film, ''Romeo Must Die'' (''Queen of the Damned'') had yet to be released. The Academy provided no comment on the oversight.

Awards

Lee was nominated for 12 Grammy Awards, winning Best Contemporary Vocal Performance for her 1969 hit "Is That All There Is?" In 1995 she was given the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Lee is a recipient of North Dakota's Roughrider Award; the Pied Piper Award from The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP); the Presidents Award, from the Songwriters Guild of America; the Ella Award for Lifetime Achievement, from the Society of Singers; and the Living Legacy Award, from the Women's International Center. In 1999 she was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Carnegie Hall tribute

In 2003, "There'll Be Another Spring: A Tribute to Miss Peggy Lee" was held at Carnegie Hall. Produced by recording artist Richard Barone, the sold-out event included performances by Cy Coleman, Debbie Harry, Nancy Sinatra, Rita Moreno, Marian McPartland, Chris Connor, Petula Clark, and others. In 2004 Barone brought the event to a sold-out Hollywood Bowl, and then to Chicago's Ravinia Festival, with expanded casts including Maureen McGovern, Jack Jones and Bea Arthur. The Carnegie Hall concert was broadcast on NPR's "Jazz Set".

In popular culture

The Peggy Lee Rose is a light pink hybrid tea rose with a "touch of peach" that was introduced in 1983 and named in her honor. Lee considered peach to be her favorite color.

Peggy Lee was known as "Miss Peggy Lee" or "Miss Peggy," and was the inspiration for the Muppets' "Miss Piggy," a stylish self-assured blonde with a sense of romance.

Bibliography

;Autobiography

Peggy Lee, ''Miss Peggy Lee: An Autobiography'', 2002, Bloomsbury (UK), ISBN 0-7475-5907-4

;Biography

Peter Richmond, ''Fever: The Life and Music of Miss Peggy Lee'', 2006, Henry Holt and Company, ISBN 0-8050-7383-3

Robert Strom, ''Miss Peggy Lee: A Career Chronicle'', 2005, McFarland Publishing, ISBN 0-7864-1936-9

;Album liner notes

Will Friedwald, Album liner notes ''The Best of Peggy Lee, The Capitol Years''

Discography

Capitol Records

1948 ''Rendezvous with Peggy Lee'' (set of 78s: 6 songs)

1952 ''Rendezvous with Peggy Lee'' (10-inch LP: 8 songs; 12-inch LP: 12 songs)

Decca Records

1953 ''Black Coffee'' (10-inch version)

1954 ''Songs in an Intimate Style''

1954 ''Selections from Irving Berlin's 'White Christmas''' (w/ Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye)

1955 ''Songs from Pete Kelly's Blues'' (w/ Ella Fitzgerald)

1956 ''Black Coffee'' (12-inch version)

1957 ''Dream Street''

1957 ''Songs from Walt Disney's "Lady and the Tramp"''

1958 ''Sea Shells'' (recorded 1955)

1959 ''Miss Wonderful'' (recorded 1956)

1964 ''Lover'' (recorded 1952)

1964 ''The Fabulous Peggy Lee'' (recorded 1953–56)

Capitol Records

1957 ''The Man I Love''

1959 ''Jump for Joy''

1959 ''Things Are Swingin'''

1959 ''I Like Men!''

1959 ''Beauty and the Beat!''

1960 ''Latin ala Lee!''

1960 ''All Aglow Again!''

1960 ''Pretty Eyes''

1960 ''Christmas Carousel''

1960 ''Olé ala Lee''

1961 ''If You Go''

1961 ''Basin Street East Proudly Presents Miss Peggy Lee''

1962 ''Blues Cross Country''

1962 ''Bewitching-Lee''

1962 ''Sugar 'N' Spice''

1963 ''Mink Jazz''

1963 ''I'm a Woman''

1964 ''In Love Again!''

1964 ''In the Name of Love''

1965 ''Pass Me By''

1965 ''Then Was Then - Now Is Now!''

1966 ''Guitars A là Lee''

1966 ''Big $pender''

1967 ''Extra Special!''

1967 ''Somethin' Groovy!''

1968 ''2 Shows Nightly''

1969 ''A Natural Woman''

1969 ''Is That All There Is?''

1970 ''Bridge Over Troubled Water''

1970 ''Make It With You''

1971 ''Where Did They Go''

1972 ''Norma Deloris Egstrom from Jamestown, North Dakota''

Post-Capitol albums

1974 ''Let's Love''

1975 ''Mirrors''

1977 ''Live in London''

1977 ''Peggy''

1979 ''Close Enough for Love''

1988 ''Miss Peggy Lee Sings the Blues''

1990 ''The Peggy Lee Songbook: There'll Be Another Spring''

1993 ''Love Held Lightly: Rare Songs by Harold Arlen'' (rec. 1988)

1993 ''Moments Like This''

Chart singles

Year	Title	Chart Positions
		! style="width:60px;"	! style="width:60px;"
	"I Got It Bad and That Ain't Good"
"Winter Weather" (w/ Art Lund)
"Blues in the Night"
"Somebody Else is Taking My Place"
"My Little Cousin"
"We'll Meet Again"
"Full Moon"
"The Way You Look Tonight"
1943	"Why Don't You Do Right"
1945	"Waitin' for the Train to Come in"
	"I'm Glad I Waited for You"
"I Don't Know Enough About You"
"Linger in My Arms a Little Longer, Baby"
"It's All Over Now"
	"It's a Good Day"
"Everything's Moving too Fast"
"Chi-baba, Chi-baba (My Bambino, Go to Sleep)"
"Golden Earrings"
	"Mañana (Is Soon Enough for Me)"
"All Dressed up with a Broken Heart"
"For Every Man, There's a Woman"
"Laroo, Laroo, Lili Bolero"
"Talking to Myself About You"
"Don't Smoke in Bed"
"Caramba! It's the Samba"
"Baby, Don't Be Mad at Me"
"Somebody Else is Taking My Place" (re-issue)
"Bubble Loo, Bubble Loo"
	"Blum Blum, I Wonder Who I Am"
"Similau (See-Me-Lo)"
"Bali Ha'i"
"Riders in the Sky (A Cowboy Legend)"
	"The Old Master Painter" (w/ Mel Torme)
"Show Me the Way to Get out of This World"
1951	"(When I Dance with You) I Get Ideas"
	"Be Anything (But Be Mine)"
"Lover"
"Watermelon Weather" (w/ Bing Crosby)
"River, River"
	"Who's Gonna Pay the Check"
"Baubles, Bangles, & Beads"
	"Where can I go Without You"
	"Mr. Wonderful"
"Joey, Joey, Joey"
"Light of Love"
"Sweetheart"
	"Alright, Okay, You Win"
"My Man"
"Hallelujah, I Love Him So"
1963	"I'm a Woman"
1964	"In the Name of Love"
	"Pass Me By"
"Free Spirits"
	"Big Spender"
"That Man"
"You've Got Possibilities"
"So, What's New"
"Walking Happy"
1967	"I Feel it"
"Is That All There Is?"
"Whistle for Happiness"
	"(Where Do I Begin?) Love Story"
"You'll Remember Me"
"One More Ride on the Merry-Go-Round"
1972	"Love Song"
1974	"Let's Love"

Film and television

;Film

''The Powers Girl'' (1943)

''Stage Door Canteen'' (1943)

''Banquet of Melody'' (1946) (short subject)

''Jasper in a Jam'' (1946) (short subject) (voice)

''Midnight Serenade'' (1947) (short subject)

''Peggy Lee and the Dave Barbour Quartet'' (1950) (short subject)

''Mr. Music'' (1950)

''The Jazz Singer'' (1952)

''Lady and the Tramp'' (1955) (voice, songwriter)

''Pete Kelly's Blues'' (1955)

''Celebrity Art'' (1973) (short subject)

;Television

Mystery guest on ''What's My Line? (February 28, 1960)

''The World of Peggy Lee'' – documentary film produced for National Educational Television (October 16, 1969)

References

External links

Official website: PeggyLee.com

Peggy Lee Discography

Songwriters Hall of Fame's Peggy Lee exhibit

Review of a Peggy Lee biography by Mark Steyn

Category:1920 births Category:2002 deaths Category:American actors Category:American contraltos Category:American female singers Category:American jazz singers Category:Songwriters from North Dakota Category:Burials at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery Category:Capitol Records artists Category:Deaths from diabetes Category:Deaths from myocardial infarction Category:Decca Records artists Category:Disease-related deaths in California Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners Category:Musicians from North Dakota Category:American people of Norwegian descent Category:American musicians of Norwegian descent Category:People from Jamestown, North Dakota Category:Songwriters Hall of Fame inductees Category:American people of Swedish descent Category:American musicians of Swedish descent Category:Torch singers Category:Traditional pop music singers Category:Female jazz singers

br:Peggy Lee cy:Peggy Lee de:Peggy Lee (Sängerin) es:Peggy Lee fa:پگی لی fr:Peggy Lee ko:페기 리 id:Peggy Lee it:Peggy Lee he:פגי לי ka:პეგი ლი la:Peggy Lee nl:Peggy Lee ja:ペギー・リー pl:Peggy Lee pt:Peggy Lee ru:Пегги Ли simple:Peggy Lee fi:Peggy Lee sv:Peggy Lee tl:Peggy Lee th:เพกกี ลี

Name	Elvis Presley
Alt	A young man dancing, swiveling his hips. He has dark hair, short and slicked up a bit. He wears an unbuttoned band-collared jacket over a shirt with bold black-and-white horizontal stripes. Behind him, on either side, are a pair of barred frames, like prison doors.
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Elvis Aaron Presley
Birth date	January 08, 1935
Birth place
Death date	August 16, 1977
Death place
Genre	Rock and roll, pop, rockabilly, country, blues, gospel, R&B;
Associated acts	The Blue Moon Boys, The Jordanaires, The Imperials
Occupation	Musician, actor
Instrument	Vocals, guitar, piano
Years active	1953–77
Label	Sun, RCA Victor
Website	}}

Elvis Aaron Presley (, 1935, 1977) was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King".

Born in Tupelo, Mississippi, Presley moved to Memphis, Tennessee, with his family at the age of 13. He began his career there in 1954, working with Sun Records owner Sam Phillips, who wanted to bring the sound of African American music to a wider audience. Accompanied by guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, Presley was the most important popularizer of rockabilly, an uptempo, backbeat-driven fusion of country and rhythm and blues. RCA Victor acquired his contract in a deal arranged by Colonel Tom Parker, who would manage the singer for over two decades. Presley's first RCA single, "Heartbreak Hotel", released in January 1956, was a number one hit. He became the leading figure of the newly popular sound of rock and roll with a series of network television appearances and chart-topping records. His energized interpretations of songs, many from African American sources, and his uninhibited performance style made him enormously popular—and controversial. In November 1956, he made his film debut in ''Love Me Tender''.

Conscripted into military service in 1958, Presley relaunched his recording career two years later with some of his most commercially successful work. He staged few concerts however, and guided by Parker, proceeded to devote much of the 1960s to making Hollywood movies and soundtrack albums, most of them critically derided. In 1968, after seven years away from the stage, he returned to live performance in a celebrated comeback television special that led to an extended Las Vegas concert residency and a string of profitable tours. In 1973 Presley staged the first concert broadcast globally via satellite, ''Aloha from Hawaii'', seen by approximately 1.5 billion viewers. Prescription drug abuse severely compromised his health, and he died suddenly in 1977 at the age of 42.

Presley is regarded as one of the most important figures of 20th-century popular culture. He had a versatile voice and unusually wide success encompassing many genres, including country, pop ballads, gospel, and blues. He is the best-selling solo artist in the history of popular music. Nominated for 14 competitive Grammys, he won three, and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award at age 36. He has been inducted into multiple music halls of fame.

Life and career

Early years (1935–53)

Childhood in Tupelo

Elvis Presley was born on January 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi, to 22-year-old Gladys Love (née Smith) and 18-year-old Vernon Elvis Presley. In the two-room shotgun house built by his father in readiness for the birth, Jesse Garon Presley, his identical twin brother, was delivered 35 minutes before him, stillborn. As an only child, Presley became close to both parents and formed an unusually tight bond with his mother. The family attended an Assembly of God church where he found his initial musical inspiration.

Presley's ancestry was primarily a Western European mix: On his mother's side, he had Scots-Irish, with some French Norman, ancestry; one of Gladys's great-great-grandmothers was Cherokee. His father's forebears were of Scottish or German origin, with more distant Dutch ancestry. Gladys was regarded by relatives and friends as the dominant member of the small family. Vernon moved from one odd job to the next, evidencing little ambition. The family often relied on help from neighbors and government food assistance. In 1938, they lost their home after Vernon was found guilty of altering a check written by the landowner. He was jailed for eight months, and Gladys and Elvis moved in with relatives.

In September 1941, Presley entered first grade at East Tupelo Consolidated, where his instructors regarded him as "average". He was encouraged to enter a singing contest after impressing his schoolteacher with a rendition of Red Foley's country song "Old Shep" during morning prayers. The contest, held at the Mississippi-Alabama Fair and Dairy Show on October 3, 1945, saw his first public performance: dressed as a cowboy, the ten-year-old Presley stood on a chair to reach the microphone and sang "Old Shep". He recalled placing fifth. A few months later, Presley received his first guitar for his birthday; he had hoped for something else—by different accounts, either a bicycle or a rifle. Over the following year, he received basic guitar lessons from two of his uncles and the new pastor at the family's church. Presley recalled, "I took the guitar, and I watched people, and I learned to play a little bit. But I would never sing in public. I was very shy about it."

Entering a new school, Milam, for sixth grade in September 1946, Presley was regarded as a loner. The following year, he began bringing his guitar in on a daily basis. He played and sang during lunchtime, and was often teased as a "trashy" kid who played hillbilly music. The family was by then living in a largely African American neighborhood. A devotee of Mississippi Slim's show on the Tupelo radio station WELO, Presley was described as "crazy about music" by Slim's younger brother, a classmate of Presley's, who often took him in to the station. Slim supplemented Presley's guitar tuition by demonstrating chord techniques. When his protégé was 12 years old, Slim scheduled him for two on-air performances. Presley was overcome by stage fright the first time, but succeeded in performing the following week.

Teenage life in Memphis

In November 1948, the family moved to Memphis, Tennessee. After residing for nearly a year in rooming houses, they were granted a two-bedroom apartment in the public housing complex known as the Courts. Enrolled at Humes High School, Presley received only a C in music in eighth grade. When his music teacher told him he had no aptitude for singing, he brought in his guitar the next day and sang a recent hit, "Keep Them Cold Icy Fingers Off Me", in an effort to prove otherwise. A classmate later recalled that the teacher "agreed that Elvis was right when he said that she didn't appreciate his kind of singing." He was generally too shy to perform openly, and was occasionally bullied by classmates who viewed him as a "mama's boy". In 1950, he began practicing guitar regularly under the tutelage of Jesse Lee Denson, a neighbor two-and-a-half years his senior. They and three other boys—including two future rockabilly pioneers, brothers Dorsey and Johnny Burnette—formed a loose musical collective that played frequently around the Courts. That September, he began ushering at Loew's State Theater. Other jobs followed during his school years: Precision Tool, Loew's again, and MARL Metal Products.

During his junior year, Presley began to stand out more among his classmates, largely because of his appearance: he grew out his sideburns and styled his hair with rose oil and Vaseline. On his own time, he would head down to Beale Street, the heart of Memphis's thriving blues scene, and gaze longingly at the wild, flashy clothes in the windows of Lansky Brothers. By his senior year, he was wearing them. Overcoming his reticence about performing outside the Courts, he competed in Humes's Annual "Minstrel" show in April 1953. Singing and playing guitar, he opened with "Till I Waltz Again with You", a recent hit for Teresa Brewer. Presley recalled that the performance did much for his reputation: "I wasn't popular in school ... I failed music—only thing I ever failed. And then they entered me in this talent show ... when I came onstage I heard people kind of rumbling and whispering and so forth, 'cause nobody knew I even sang. It was amazing how popular I became after that."

Presley, who never received formal music training or learned to read music, studied and played by ear. He frequented record stores with jukeboxes and listening booths. He knew all of Hank Snow's songs and he loved records by other country singers such as Roy Acuff, Ernest Tubb, Ted Daffan, Jimmie Rodgers, Jimmie Davis, and Bob Wills. The Southern Gospel singer Jake Hess, one of his favorite performers, was a significant influence on his ballad-singing style. He was a regular audience member at the monthly All-Night Singings downtown, where many of the white gospel groups that performed reflected the influence of African American spiritual music. He adored the music of black gospel singer Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Like some of his peers, he may have attended blues venues—of necessity, in the segregated South, only on nights designated for exclusively white audiences. He certainly listened to the regional radio stations that played "race records": spirituals, blues, and the modern, backbeat-heavy sound of rhythm and blues. Many of his future recordings were inspired by local African American musicians such as Arthur Crudup and Rufus Thomas. B.B. King recalled that he knew Presley before he was popular when they both used to frequent Beale Street. By the time he graduated high school in June 1953, Presley had already singled out music as his future.

First recordings (1953–55)

Sam Phillips and Sun Records

In August 1953, Presley walked into the offices of Sun Records. He aimed to pay for a few minutes of studio time to record a two-sided acetate disc: "My Happiness" and "That's When Your Heartaches Begin". He would later claim he intended the record as a gift for his mother, or was merely interested in what he "sounded like", though there was a much cheaper, amateur record-making service at a nearby general store. Biographer Peter Guralnick argues that he chose Sun in the hope of being discovered. Asked by receptionist Marion Keisker what kind of singer he was, Presley responded, "I sing all kinds." When she pressed him on whom he sounded like, he repeatedly answered, "I don't sound like nobody." After he recorded, Sun boss Sam Phillips asked Keisker to note down the young man's name, which she did along with her own commentary: "Good ballad singer. Hold." Presley cut a second acetate in January 1954—"I'll Never Stand In Your Way" and "It Wouldn't Be the Same Without You"—but again nothing came of it.

Not long after, he failed an audition for a local vocal quartet, the Songfellows. He explained to his father, "They told me I couldn't sing." Songfellow Jim Hamill later claimed that he was turned down because he did not demonstrate an ear for harmony at the time. In April, Presley began working for the Crown Electric company as a truck driver. His friend Ronnie Smith, after playing a few local gigs with him, suggested he contact Eddie Bond, leader of Smith's professional band, which had an opening for a vocalist. Bond rejected him after a tryout, advising Presley to stick to truck driving "because you're never going to make it as a singer."

Phillips, meanwhile, was always on the lookout for someone who could bring the sound of the black musicians on whom Sun focused to a broader audience. As Keisker reported, "Over and over I remember Sam saying, 'If I could find a white man who had the Negro sound and the Negro feel, I could make a billion dollars.'" In June, he acquired a demo recording of a ballad, "Without You", that he thought might suit the teenaged singer. Presley came by the studio, but was unable to do it justice. Despite this, Phillips asked Presley to sing as many numbers as he knew. He was sufficiently affected by what he heard to invite two local musicians, guitarist Winfield "Scotty" Moore and upright bass player Bill Black, to work something up with Presley for a recording session. }} The session, held the evening of July 5, proved entirely unfruitful until late in the night. As they were about to give up and go home, Presley took his guitar and launched into a 1946 blues number, Arthur Crudup's "That's All Right". Moore recalled, "All of a sudden, Elvis just started singing this song, jumping around and acting the fool, and then Bill picked up his bass, and he started acting the fool, too, and I started playing with them. Sam, I think, had the door to the control booth open ... he stuck his head out and said, 'What are you doing?' And we said, 'We don't know.' 'Well, back up,' he said, 'try to find a place to start, and do it again.'" Phillips quickly began taping; this was the sound he had been looking for. Three days later, popular Memphis DJ Dewey Phillips played "That's All Right" on his ''Red, Hot, and Blue'' show. Listeners began phoning in, eager to find out who the singer was. The interest was such that Phillips played the record repeatedly during the last two hours of his show. Interviewing Presley on-air, Phillips asked him what high school he attended in order to clarify his color for the many callers who had assumed he was black. During the next few days the trio recorded a bluegrass number, Bill Monroe's "Blue Moon of Kentucky", again in a distinctive style and employing a jury-rigged echo effect that Sam Phillips dubbed "slapback". A single was pressed with "That's All Right" on the A side and "Blue Moon of Kentucky" on the reverse.

Early live performances and signing to RCA

The trio played publicly for the first time on July 17 at the Bon Air club—Presley still sporting his child-size guitar. At the end of the month, they appeared at the Overton Park Shell, with Slim Whitman headlining. A combination of his strong response to rhythm and nervousness at playing before a large crowd led Presley to shake his legs as he performed: his wide-cut pants emphasized his movements, causing young women in the audience to start screaming. Moore recalled, "During the instrumental parts he would back off from the mike and be playing and shaking, and the crowd would just go wild". Black, a natural showman, whooped and rode his bass, hitting double licks that Presley would later remember as "really a wild sound, like a jungle drum or something". Soon after, Moore and Black quit their old band to play with Presley regularly, and DJ and promoter Bob Neal became the trio's manager. From August through October, they played frequently at the Eagle's Nest club and returned to Sun Studio for more recording sessions, and Presley quickly grew more confident on stage. According to Moore, "His movement was a natural thing, but he was also very conscious of what got a reaction. He'd do something one time and then he would expand on it real quick." Presley made what would be his only appearance on Nashville's ''Grand Ole Opry'' on October 2; after a polite audience response, ''Opry'' manager Jim Denny told Phillips that his singer was "not bad" but did not suit the program. Two weeks later, Presley was booked on ''Louisiana Hayride'', the ''Opry''s chief, and more adventurous, rival. The Shreveport-based show was broadcast to 198 radio stations in 28 states. Presley had another attack of nerves during the first set, which drew a muted reaction. A more composed and energetic second set inspired an enthusiastic response. House drummer D.J. Fontana brought a new element, complementing Presley's movements with accented beats that he had mastered playing in strip clubs. Soon after the show, the ''Hayride'' engaged Presley for a year's worth of Saturday-night appearances. Trading in his old guitar for $8 (and seeing it promptly dispatched to the garbage), he purchased a Martin instrument for $175, and his trio began playing in new locales including Houston, Texas, and Texarkana, Arkansas.

By early 1955, Presley's regular ''Hayride'' appearances, constant touring, and well-received record releases had made him a substantial regional star, from Tennessee to West Texas. In January, Neal signed a formal management contract with Presley and brought the singer to the attention of Colonel Tom Parker, whom he considered the best promoter in the music business. Parker—Dutch-born, though he claimed to be from West Virginia—had acquired an honorary colonel's commission from country singer turned Louisiana governor Jimmie Davis. Having successfully managed top country star Eddy Arnold, he was now working with the new number one country singer, Hank Snow. Parker booked Presley on Snow's February tour. When the tour reached Odessa, Texas, a 19-year-old Roy Orbison saw Presley for the first time: "His energy was incredible, his instinct was just amazing. ... I just didn't know what to make of it. There was just no reference point in the culture to compare it." Presley made his television debut on March 3 on the KSLA-TV broadcast of ''Louisiana Hayride''. Soon after, he failed an audition for ''Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts'' on the CBS television network. By August, Sun had released ten sides credited to "Elvis Presley, Scotty and Bill"; on the latest recordings, the trio were joined by a drummer. Some of the songs, like "That's All Right", were in what one Memphis journalist described as the "R&B; idiom of negro field jazz"; others, like "Blue Moon of Kentucky", were "more in the country field", "but there was a curious blending of the two different musics in both". This blend of styles made it difficult for Presley's music to find radio airplay. According to Neal, many country music disc jockeys would not play it because he sounded too much like a black artist and none of the rhythm and blues stations would touch him because "he sounded too much like a hillbilly." The blend came to be known as rockabilly. At the time, Presley was variously billed as "The King of Western Bop", "The Hillbilly Cat", and "The Memphis Flash".

Presley renewed Neal's management contract in August 1955, simultaneously appointing Parker as his special adviser. The group maintained an extensive touring schedule throughout the second half of the year. Neal recalled, "It was almost frightening, the reaction that came to Elvis from the teenaged boys. So many of them, through some sort of jealousy, would practically hate him. There were occasions in some towns in Texas when we'd have to be sure to have a police guard because somebody'd always try to take a crack at him. They'd get a gang and try to waylay him or something." The trio became a quartet when ''Hayride'' drummer Fontana joined as a full member. In mid-October, they played a few shows in support of Bill Haley, whose "Rock Around the Clock" had been a number one hit the previous year. Haley observed that Presley had a natural feel for rhythm, and advised him to sing fewer ballads.

At the Country Disc Jockey Convention in early November, Presley was voted the year's most promising male artist. Several record companies had by now shown interest in signing him. After three major labels made offers of up to $25,000, Parker and Phillips struck a deal with RCA Victor on November 21 to acquire Presley's Sun contract for an unprecedented $40,000. Presley, at 20, was still a minor, so his father signed the contract. Parker arranged with the owners of Hill and Range Publishing, Jean and Julian Aberbach, to create two entities, Elvis Presley Music and Gladys Music, to handle all of the new material recorded by Presley. Songwriters were obliged to forego one third of their customary royalties in exchange for having him perform their compositions. By December, RCA had begun to heavily promote its new singer, and before month's end had reissued many of his Sun recordings.

Commercial breakout and controversy (1956–58)

First national TV appearances and debut album

On January 10, 1956, Presley made his first recordings for RCA in Nashville. Extending the singer's by now customary backup of Moore, Black, and Fontana, RCA enlisted pianist Floyd Cramer, guitarist Chet Atkins, and three background singers, including Gordon Stoker of the popular Jordanaires quartet, to fill out the sound. The session produced the moody, unusual "Heartbreak Hotel", released as a single on January 27. Parker finally brought Presley to national television, booking him on CBS's ''Stage Show'' for six appearances over two months. The program, produced in New York, was hosted on alternate weeks by big band leaders and brothers Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey. After his first appearance, on January 28, Presley stayed in town to record at RCA's New York studio. The sessions yielded eight songs, including a cover of Carl Perkins' rockabilly anthem "Blue Suede Shoes". In February, Presley's "I Forgot to Remember to Forget", a Sun recording initially released the previous August, reached the top of the ''Billboard'' country chart. Neal's contract was terminated and, on March 2, Parker became Presley's manager. RCA Victor released Presley's self-titled debut album on March 23. Joined by five previously unreleased Sun recordings, its seven recently recorded tracks were of a broad variety. There were two country songs and a bouncy pop tune. The others would centrally define the evolving sound of rock and roll: "Blue Suede Shoes"—"an improvement over Perkins' in almost every way", according to critic Robert Hilburn—and three R&B; numbers that had been part of Presley's stage repertoire for some time, covers of Little Richard, Ray Charles, and The Drifters. As described by Hilburn, these "were the most revealing of all. Unlike many white artists ... who watered down the gritty edges of the original R&B; versions of songs in the '50s, Presley reshaped them. He not only injected the tunes with his own vocal character but also made guitar, not piano, the lead instrument in all three cases." It became the first rock and roll album to top the ''Billboard'' chart, a position it held for 10 weeks. While Presley was not an innovative instrumentalist like Moore or contemporary African American rockers Bo Diddley and Chuck Berry, cultural historian Gilbert B. Rodman argues that the album's cover image, "of Elvis having the time of his life on stage ''with a guitar in his hands'' played a crucial role in positioning the guitar...as the instrument that best captured the style and spirit of this new music."

''Milton Berle Show'' and "Hound Dog"

Presley made the first of two appearances on NBC's ''Milton Berle Show'' on April 3. His performance, on the deck of the USS ''Hancock'' in San Diego, prompted cheers and screams from an audience of sailors and their dates. A few days later, a flight taking Presley and his band to Nashville for a recording session left all three badly shaken when an engine died and the plane almost went down over Arkansas. Twelve weeks after its original release, "Heartbreak Hotel" became Presley's first number one pop hit. In late April, Presley began a two-week residency at the New Frontier Hotel and Casino on the Las Vegas Strip. The shows were poorly received by the conservative, middle-aged hotel guests—"like a jug of corn liquor at a champagne party", wrote a critic for ''Newsweek''. Amid his Vegas tenure, Presley, who had serious acting ambitions, signed a seven-year contract with Paramount Pictures. He began a tour of the Midwest in mid-May, taking in 15 cities in as many days. He had attended several shows by Freddie Bell and the Bellboys in Vegas, and was struck by their cover of "Hound Dog", a hit in 1953 for blues singer Big Mama Thornton by songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. It became the new closing number of his act. After a show in La Crosse, Wisconsin, an urgent message on the letterhead of the local Catholic diocese's newspaper was sent to FBI director J. Edgar Hoover. It warned that "Presley is a definite danger to the security of the United States. ... [His] actions and motions were such as to rouse the sexual passions of teenaged youth. ... After the show, more than 1,000 teenagers tried to gang into Presley's room at the auditorium. ... Indications of the harm Presley did just in La Crosse were the two high school girls ... whose abdomen and thigh had Presley's autograph."

The second ''Milton Berle Show'' appearance came on June 5 at NBC's Hollywood studio, amid another hectic tour. Berle persuaded the singer to leave his guitar backstage, advising, "Let 'em see you, son." During the performance, Presley abruptly halted an uptempo rendition of "Hound Dog" with a wave of his arm and launched into a slow, grinding version accentuated with energetic, exaggerated body movements. Presley's gyrations created a storm of controversy. Television critics were outraged: Jack Gould of ''The New York Times'' wrote, "Mr. Presley has no discernible singing ability. ... His phrasing, if it can be called that, consists of the stereotyped variations that go with a beginner's aria in a bathtub. ... His one specialty is an accented movement of the body ... primarily identified with the repertoire of the blond bombshells of the burlesque runway." Ben Gross of the New York ''Daily News'' opined that popular music "has reached its lowest depths in the 'grunt and groin' antics of one Elvis Presley. ... Elvis, who rotates his pelvis ... gave an exhibition that was suggestive and vulgar, tinged with the kind of animalism that should be confined to dives and bordellos". Ed Sullivan, whose own variety show was the nation's most popular, declared him "unfit for family viewing". To Presley's displeasure, he soon found himself being referred to as "Elvis the Pelvis", which he called "one of the most childish expressions I ever heard, comin' from an adult."

''Steve Allen Show'' and first Sullivan appearance

The Berle shows drew such high ratings that Presley was booked for a July 1 appearance on NBC's ''Steve Allen Show'' in New York. Allen, no fan of rock and roll, introduced a "new Elvis" in a white bow tie and black tails. Presley sang "Hound Dog" for less than a minute to a basset hound wearing a top hat and bow tie. As described by television historian Jake Austen, "Allen thought Presley was talentless and absurd... [he] set things up so that Presley would show his contrition". Allen, for his part, later wrote that he found Presley's "strange, gangly, country-boy charisma, his hard-to-define cuteness, and his charming eccentricity intriguing" and simply worked the singer into the customary "comedy fabric" of his program. Presley would refer back to the Allen show as the most ridiculous performance of his career. Later that night, he appeared on ''Hy Gardner Calling'', a popular local TV show. Pressed on whether he had learned anything from the criticism to which he was being subjected, Presley responded, "No, I haven't, I don't feel like I'm doing anything wrong. ... I don't see how any type of music would have any bad influence on people when it's only music. ... I mean, how would rock 'n' roll music make anyone rebel against their parents?"

The next day, Presley recorded "Hound Dog", along with "Any Way You Want Me" and "Don't Be Cruel". The Jordanaires sang harmony, as they had on ''The Steve Allen Show''; they would work with Presley through the 1960s. A few days later, the singer made an outdoor concert appearance in Memphis at which he announced, "You know, those people in New York are not gonna change me none. I'm gonna show you what the real Elvis is like tonight." In August, a judge in Jacksonville, Florida, ordered Presley to tame his act. Throughout the following performance, he largely kept still, except for wiggling his little finger suggestively in mockery of the order. The single pairing "Don't Be Cruel" with "Hound Dog" ruled the top of the charts for 11 weeks—a mark that would not be surpassed for 36 years. Recording sessions for Presley's second album took place in Hollywood during the first week of September. Leiber and Stoller, the writers of "Hound Dog", contributed "Love Me".

Allen's show with Presley had, for the first time, beaten CBS's ''Ed Sullivan Show'' in the ratings. Sullivan, despite his June pronouncement, booked the singer for three appearances for an unprecedented $50,000. The first, on September 9, 1956, was seen by approximately 60 million viewers—a record 82.6 percent of the television audience. Actor Charles Laughton hosted the show, filling in while Sullivan recuperated from a car accident. Presley appeared in two segments that night from CBS Television City in Los Angeles. According to Elvis legend, Presley was shot only from the waist up. Watching clips of the Allen and Berle shows with his producer, Sullivan had opined that Presley "got some kind of device hanging down below the crotch of his pants–so when he moves his legs back and forth you can see the outline of his cock. ... I think it's a Coke bottle. ... We just can't have this on a Sunday night. This is a family show!" Sullivan publicly told ''TV Guide'', "As for his gyrations, the whole thing can be controlled with camera shots." In fact, Presley was shown head-to-toe in the first and second shows. Though the camerawork was relatively discreet during his debut, with leg-concealing closeups when he danced, the studio audience reacted in customary style: screaming. Presley's performance of his forthcoming single, the ballad "Love Me Tender", prompted a record-shattering million advance orders. More than any other single event, it was this first appearance on ''The Ed Sullivan Show'' that made Presley a national celebrity of barely precedented proportions.

Accompanying Presley's rise to fame, a cultural shift was taking place that he both helped inspire and came to symbolize. Igniting the "biggest pop craze since Glenn Miller and Frank Sinatra ... Presley brought rock'n'roll into the mainstream of popular culture", writes historian Marty Jezer. "As Presley set the artistic pace, other artists followed. ... Presley, more than anyone else, gave the young a belief in themselves as a distinct and somehow unified generation—the first in America ever to feel the power of an integrated youth culture."

Crazed crowds and movie debut

The audience response at Presley's live shows became increasingly fevered. Moore recalled, "He'd start out, 'You ain't nothin' but a Hound Dog,' and they'd just go to pieces. They'd always react the same way. There'd be a riot every time." At the two concerts he performed in September at the Mississippi-Alabama Fair and Dairy Show, 50 National Guardsmen were added to the police security to prevent crowd trouble. ''Elvis'', Presley's second album, was released in October and quickly rose to number one. Assessing the musical and cultural impact of Presley's recordings from "That's All Right" through ''Elvis'', rock critic Dave Marsh wrote that "these records, more than any others, contain the seeds of what rock & roll was, has been and most likely what it may foreseeably become."

Presley returned to the Sullivan show at its main studio in New York, hosted this time by its namesake, on October 28. After the performance, crowds in Nashville and St. Louis burned him in effigy. His first motion picture, ''Love Me Tender'', was released on November 21. Though he was not top billed, the film's original title—''The Reno Brothers''—was changed to capitalize on his latest number one record: "Love Me Tender" had hit the top of the charts earlier that month. To further take advantage of Presley's popularity, four musical numbers were added to what was originally a straight acting role. The movie was panned by the critics but did very well at the box office. Presley would receive top billing on every subsequent film he made.

On December 4, Presley dropped into Sun Records where Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis were recording and jammed with them. Though Phillips no longer had the right to release any Presley material, he made sure the session was captured on tape. The results became legendary as the "Million Dollar Quartet" recordings—Johnny Cash was long thought to have played as well, but he was present only briefly at Phillips' instigation for a photo opportunity. The year ended with a front-page story in ''The Wall Street Journal'' reporting that Presley merchandise had brought in $22 million on top of his record sales, and ''Billboard''s declaration that he had placed more songs in the top 100 than any other artist since records were first charted. In his first full year on RCA, one of the music industry's largest companies, Presley had accounted for over 50 percent of the label's singles sales.

Leiber and Stoller collaboration and draft notice

Presley made his third and final ''Ed Sullivan Show'' appearance on January 6, 1957—on this occasion indeed shot only down to the waist. Some commentators have claimed that Parker orchestrated an appearance of censorship to generate publicity. In any event, as critic Greil Marcus describes, Presley "did not tie himself down. Leaving behind the bland clothes he had worn on the first two shows, he stepped out in the outlandish costume of a pasha, if not a harem girl. From the make-up over his eyes, the hair falling in his face, the overwhelmingly sexual cast of his mouth, he was playing Rudolph Valentino in ''The Sheik'', with all stops out." To close, displaying his range and defying Sullivan's wishes, Presley sang a gentle black spiritual, "Peace in the Valley". At the end of the show, Sullivan declared Presley "a real decent, fine boy". Two days later, the Memphis draft board announced that Presley would be classified 1A and would probably be drafted sometime that year. Each of the three Presley singles released in the first half of 1957 went to number one: "Too Much", "All Shook Up", and "(Let Me Be Your) Teddy Bear". Already an international star, he was attracting fans even where his music was not officially released. Under the headline "Presley Records a Craze in Soviet", ''The New York Times'' reported that pressings of his music on discarded X-ray plates were commanding high prices in Leningrad. Between film shoots and recording sessions, the singer also found time to purchase an 18-room mansion eight miles (13 km) south of downtown Memphis for himself and his parents: Graceland. ''Loving You''—the soundtrack to his second film, released in July—was Presley's third straight number one album. The title track was written by Leiber and Stoller, who were then retained to write four of the six songs recorded at the sessions for ''Jailhouse Rock'', Presley's next movie. The songwriting team effectively produced the ''Jailhouse'' sessions and developed a close working relationship with Presley, who came to regard them as his "good-luck charm". The title track was yet another number one hit, as was the ''Jailhouse Rock'' EP.

Presley undertook three brief tours during the year, continuing to generate a crazed audience response. A Detroit newspaper suggested that "the trouble with going to see Elvis Presley is that you're liable to get killed." Villanova students pelted him with eggs in Philadelphia, and in Vancouver, the crowd rioted after the end of the show, destroying the stage. Frank Sinatra, who had famously inspired the swooning of teenaged girls in the 1940s, condemned the new musical phenomenon. In a magazine article, he decried rock and roll as "brutal, ugly, degenerate, vicious. ... It fosters almost totally negative and destructive reactions in young people. It smells phoney and false. It is sung, played and written, for the most part, by cretinous goons. ... This rancid-smelling aphrodisiac I deplore." Asked for a response, Presley said, "I admire the man. He has a right to say what he wants to say. He is a great success and a fine actor, but I think he shouldn't have said it. ... This is a trend, just the same as he faced when he started years ago."

Leiber and Stoller were again in the studio for the recording of ''Elvis' Christmas Album''. Toward the end of the session, they wrote a song on the spot at Presley's request: "Santa Claus Is Back In Town", an innuendo-laden blues. The holiday release stretched Presley's string of number one albums to four and would eventually become the best selling Christmas album of all time. After the session, Moore and Black—drawing only modest weekly salaries, sharing in none of Presley's massive financial success—resigned. Though they were brought back on a per diem basis a few weeks later, it was clear that they had not been part of Presley's inner circle for some time. On December 20, Presley received his draft notice. He was granted a deferment to finish the forthcoming ''King Creole'', in which $350,000 had already been invested by Paramount and producer Hal Wallis. A couple of weeks into the new year, "Don't", another Leiber and Stoller tune, became Presley's tenth number one seller. It had been only 21 months since "Heartbreak Hotel" had brought him to the top for the first time. Recording sessions for the ''King Creole'' soundtrack were held in Hollywood mid-January. Leiber and Stoller provided three songs and were again on hand, but it would be the last time they worked closely with Presley. A studio session on February 1 marked another ending: it was the final occasion on which Black was to perform with Presley. He died in 1965.

Military service and mother's death (1958–60)

On March 24, Presley was inducted into the U.S. Army as a private at Fort Chaffee, near Fort Smith, Arkansas. His arrival was a major media event. Hundreds of people descended on Presley as he stepped from the bus; photographers then accompanied him into the base. Presley announced that he was looking forward to his military stint, saying he did not want to be treated any differently from anyone else: "The Army can do anything it wants with me."

Soon after Presley commenced basic training at Fort Hood, Texas, he received a visit from Eddie Fadal, a businessman he had met on tour. According to Fadal, Presley had become convinced his career was finished—"He firmly believed that." During a two-week leave in early June, Presley cut five sides in Nashville. In early August, his mother was diagnosed with hepatitis and her condition swiftly worsened. Presley, granted emergency leave to visit her, arrived in Memphis on August 12. Two days later, she died of heart failure, aged 46. Presley was devastated; their relationship had remained extremely close—even into his adulthood, they would use baby talk with each other and Presley would address her with pet names.

After training, Presley joined the 3rd Armored Division in Friedberg, Germany, on October 1. Introduced to amphetamines by a sergeant while on maneuvers, he became "practically evangelical about their benefits"—not only for energy, but for "strength" and weight loss, as well—and many of his friends in the outfit joined him in indulging. The Army also introduced Presley to karate, which he studied seriously, later including it in his live performances. Fellow soldiers have attested to Presley's wish to be seen as an able, ordinary soldier, despite his fame, and to his generosity. He donated his Army pay to charity, purchased TV sets for the base, and bought an extra set of fatigues for everyone in his outfit.

While in Friedberg, Presley met 14-year-old Priscilla Beaulieu. They would eventually marry after a seven-and-a-half-year courtship. In her autobiography, Priscilla says that despite his worries that it would ruin his career, Parker convinced Presley that to gain popular respect, he should serve his country as a regular soldier rather than in Special Services, where he would have been able to give some musical performances and remain in touch with the public. Media reports echoed Presley's concerns about his career, but RCA producer Steve Sholes and Freddy Bienstock of Hill and Range had carefully prepared for his two-year hiatus. Armed with a substantial amount of unreleased material, they kept up a regular stream of successful releases. Between his induction and discharge, Presley had ten top 40 hits, including "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck", the best-selling "Hard Headed Woman", and "One Night" in 1958, and "(Now and Then There's) A Fool Such as I" and the number one "A Big Hunk o' Love" in 1959. RCA also generated four albums compiling old material during this period, most successfully ''Elvis' Golden Records'' (1958), which hit number three on the LP chart.

Focus on movies (1960–67)

''Elvis Is Back''

}} Presley returned to the United States on March 2, 1960, and was honorably discharged with the rank of sergeant on March 5. The train that carried him from New Jersey to Tennessee was mobbed all the way, and Presley was called upon to appear at scheduled stops to please his fans. On the night of March 20, he entered RCA's Nashville studio to cut tracks for a new album along with a single—"Stuck on You" was rushed into release and swiftly became a number one hit. Another Nashville session two weeks later yielded a pair of his best-selling singles, the ballads "It's Now or Never" and "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", along with the rest of ''Elvis Is Back!'' The album features several songs described by Greil Marcus as full of Chicago blues "menace, driven by Presley's own super-miked acoustic guitar, brilliant playing by Scotty Moore, and demonic sax work from Boots Randolph. Elvis's singing wasn't sexy, it was pornographic." As a whole, the record "conjured up the vision of a performer who could be all things", in the words of music historian John Robertson: "a flirtatious teenage idol with a heart of gold; a tempestuous, dangerous lover; a gutbucket blues singer; a sophisticated nightclub entertainer; [a] raucous rocker". Released only days after recording was complete, it reached number two on the album chart.

Presley returned to television on May 12 as a guest on ''The Frank Sinatra Timex Special''—ironic for both stars, given Sinatra's not-so-distant excoriation of rock and roll. Also known as ''Welcome Home Elvis'', the show had been taped in late March, the only time all year Presley performed in front of an audience. Parker secured an unheard-of $125,000 fee for eight minutes of singing. The broadcast drew an enormous viewership.

''G.I. Blues'', the soundtrack to Presley's first film since his return, was a number one album in October. His first LP of sacred material, ''His Hand in Mine'', followed two months later. It reached number 13 on the U.S. pop chart and number 3 in Great Britain, remarkable figures for a gospel album. In February 1961, Presley performed two shows for a benefit event in Memphis, on behalf of 24 local charities. During a luncheon preceding the event, RCA presented him with a plaque certifying worldwide sales of over 75 million records. A 12-hour Nashville session in mid-March yielded nearly all of Presley's next studio album, ''Something for Everybody''. As described by John Robertson, it exemplifies the Nashville sound, the restrained, cosmopolitan style that would define country music in the 1960s. Presaging much of what was to come from Presley himself over the next half-decade, the album is largely "a pleasant, unthreatening pastiche of the music that had once been Elvis's birthright." It would be his sixth number one LP. Another benefit concert, raising money for a Pearl Harbor memorial, was staged on March 25, in Hawaii. It was to be Presley's last public performance for seven years.

Lost in Hollywood

Parker had by now pushed Presley into a heavy moviemaking schedule, focused on formulaic, modestly budgeted musical comedies. Presley at first insisted on pursuing more serious roles, but when two films in a more dramatic vein—''Flaming Star'' (1960) and ''Wild in the Country'' (1961)—were less commercially successful, he reverted to the formula. Among the 27 movies he made during the 1960s, there were few further exceptions. His films were almost universally panned; one critic dismissed them as a "pantheon of bad taste". Nonetheless, they were virtually all profitable. Hal Wallis, who produced nine of them, declared, "A Presley picture is the only sure thing in Hollywood."

Of Presley's films in the 1960s, 15 were accompanied by soundtrack albums and another 5 by soundtrack EPs. The movies' rapid production and release schedules—he frequently starred in three a year—affected his music. According to Jerry Leiber, the soundtrack formula was already evident before Presley left for the Army: "three ballads, one medium-tempo [number], one up-tempo, and one break blues boogie". As the decade wore on, the quality of the soundtrack songs grew "progressively worse". Julie Parrish, who appeared in ''Paradise, Hawaiian Style'' (1966), says that he hated many of the songs chosen for his films. The Jordanaires' Gordon Stoker describes how Presley would retreat from the studio microphone: "The material was so bad that he felt like he couldn't sing it." Most of the movie albums featured a song or two from respected writers such as the team of Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman. But by and large, according to biographer Jerry Hopkins, the numbers seemed to be "written on order by men who never really understood Elvis or rock and roll." Regardless of the songs' quality, it has been argued that Presley generally sang them well, with commitment. Critic Dave Marsh heard the opposite: "Presley isn't trying, probably the wisest course in the face of material like 'No Room to Rumba in a Sports Car' and 'Rock-a-Hula Baby.'"

In the first half of the decade, three of Presley's soundtrack albums hit number one on the pop charts, and a few of his most popular songs came from his films, such as "Can't Help Falling in Love" (1961) and "Return to Sender" (1962). ("Viva Las Vegas", the title track to the 1964 film, was a minor hit as a B-side, and became truly popular only later.) But, as with artistic merit, the commercial returns steadily diminished. During a five-year span—1964 through 1968—Presley had only one top ten hit: "Crying in the Chapel" (1965), a gospel number recorded back in 1960. As for non-movie albums, between the June 1962 release of ''Pot Luck'' and the November 1968 release of the soundtrack to the television special that signaled his comeback, only one LP of new material by Presley was issued: the gospel album ''How Great Thou Art'' (1967). It won him his first Grammy Award, for Best Sacred Performance. As Marsh described, Presley was "arguably the greatest white gospel singer of his time [and] really the last rock & roll artist to make gospel as vital a component of his musical personality as his secular songs."

Shortly before Christmas 1966, more than seven years since they first met, Presley proposed to Priscilla Beaulieu. They were married on May 1, 1967, in a brief ceremony in their suite at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas. The flow of formulaic movies and assembly-line soundtracks rolled on. It was not until October 1967, when the ''Clambake'' soundtrack LP registered record low sales for a new Presley album, that RCA executives recognized a problem. "By then, of course, the damage had been done", as historians Connie Kirchberg and Marc Hendrickx put it. "Elvis was viewed as a joke by serious music lovers and a has-been to all but his most loyal fans."

Comeback (1968–73)

''Elvis'': the '68 Comeback Special

Presley's only child, Lisa Marie, was born on February 1, 1968, during a period when he had grown deeply unhappy with his career. Of the eight Presley singles released between January 1967 and May 1968, only two charted in the top 40, and none higher than number 28. His forthcoming soundtrack album, ''Speedway'', would die at number 82 on the ''Billboard'' chart. Parker had already shifted his plans to television, where Presley had not appeared since the Sinatra Timex show in 1960. He maneuvered a deal with NBC that committed the network to both finance a theatrical feature and broadcast a Christmas special.

Recorded in late June in Burbank, California, the special, called simply ''Elvis'', aired on December 3, 1968. Later known as the '68 Comeback Special, the show featured lavishly staged studio productions as well as songs performed with a band in front of a small audience—Presley's first live performances since 1961. The live segments saw Presley clad in tight black leather, singing and playing guitar in an uninhibited style reminiscent of his early rock and roll days. Director and coproducer Steve Binder had worked hard to reassure the nervous singer and to produce a show that was far from the hour of Christmas songs Parker had originally planned. The show, NBC's highest rated that season, captured 42 percent of the total viewing audience. Jon Landau of ''Eye'' magazine remarked, "There is something magical about watching a man who has lost himself find his way back home. He sang with the kind of power people no longer expect of rock 'n' roll singers. He moved his body with a lack of pretension and effort that must have made Jim Morrison green with envy." Dave Marsh calls the performance one of "emotional grandeur and historical resonance."

By January 1969, the single "If I Can Dream", written for the special, reached number 12. The soundtrack album broke into the top ten. According to friend Jerry Schilling, the special reminded Presley of what "he had not been able to do for years, being able to choose the people; being able to choose what songs and not being told what had to be on the soundtrack. ... He was out of prison, man." Binder said of Presley's reaction, "I played Elvis the 60-minute show, and he told me in the screening room, 'Steve, it's the greatest thing I've ever done in my life. I give you my word I will never sing a song I don't believe in.'"

''From Elvis In Memphis'' and the International

}} Buoyed by the experience of the Comeback Special, Presley engaged in a prolific series of recording sessions at American Sound Studio, which led to the acclaimed ''From Elvis in Memphis''. Released in June 1969, it was his first secular, non-soundtrack album from a dedicated period in the studio in eight years. As described by Dave Marsh, it is "a masterpiece in which Presley immediately catches up with pop music trends that had seemed to pass him by during the movie years. He sings country songs, soul songs and rockers with real conviction, a stunning achievement." The album featured the hit single "In the Ghetto", issued in April, which reached number three on the pop chart—Presley's first non-gospel top ten hit since "Bossa Nova Baby" in 1963. Further hit singles were culled from the American Sound sessions: "Suspicious Minds", "Don't Cry Daddy", and "Kentucky Rain".

Presley was keen to resume regular live performing. Following the success of the Comeback Special, offers came in from around the world. The London Palladium offered Parker $28,000 for a one-week engagement. He responded, "That's fine for me, now how much can you get for Elvis?" In May, the brand new International Hotel in Las Vegas, boasting the largest showroom in the city, announced that it had booked Presley. He was scheduled to perform 57 shows over four weeks beginning July 31. Moore, Fontana, and the Jordanaires declined to participate, afraid of losing the lucrative session work they had in Nashville. Presley assembled new, top-notch accompaniment, led by guitarist James Burton and including two gospel groups, The Imperials and Sweet Inspirations. Nonetheless, he was nervous: his only previous Las Vegas engagement, in 1956, had been dismal. Parker, who intended to make Presley's return the show business event of the year, oversaw a major promotional push. For his part, hotel owner Kirk Kerkorian arranged to send his own plane to New York to fly in rock journalists for the debut performance.

Presley took to the stage without introduction. The audience of 2,200, including many celebrities, gave him a standing ovation before he sang a note and another after his performance. A third followed his encore, "Can't Help Falling in Love" (a song that would be his closing number for much of the 1970s). At a press conference after the show, when a journalist referred to him as "The King", Presley gestured toward Fats Domino, who was taking in the scene. "No," Presley said, "that's the real king of rock and roll." The next day, Parker's negotiations with the hotel resulted in a five-year contract for Presley to play each February and August, at an annual salary of $1 million. ''Newsweek'' commented, "There are several unbelievable things about Elvis, but the most incredible is his staying power in a world where meteoric careers fade like shooting stars." ''Rolling Stone'' called Presley "supernatural, his own resurrection." In November, Presley's final non-concert movie, ''Change of Habit'', opened. The double album ''From Memphis To Vegas/From Vegas To Memphis'' came out the same month; the first LP consisted of live performances from the International, the second of more cuts from the American Sound sessions. "Suspicious Minds" reached the top of the charts—Presley's first U.S. pop number one in over seven years, and his last.

Cassandra Peterson, later television's Elvira, met Presley during this period in Las Vegas, where she was working as showgirl. She recalls of their encounter, "He was so anti-drug when I met him. I mentioned to him that I smoked marijuana, and he was just appalled. He said, 'Don't ever do that again.'" Presley was not only deeply opposed to recreational drugs, he also rarely drank. Several of his family members had been alcoholics, a fate he intended to avoid.

Back on tour and meeting Nixon

Presley returned to the International early in 1970 for the first of the year's two month-long engagements, performing two shows a night. Recordings from these shows were issued on the album ''On Stage''. In late February, Presley performed six attendance-record–breaking shows at the Houston Astrodome. In April, the single "The Wonder of You" was issued—a number one hit in Great Britain, it topped the U.S. adult contemporary chart, as well. MGM filmed rehearsal and concert footage at the International during August for the documentary ''Elvis: That's the Way It Is''. Presley was by now performing in a jumpsuit, which would become a trademark of his live act. During this engagement, he was threatened with murder unless $50,000 was paid. Presley had been the target of many threats since the 1950s, often without his knowledge. The FBI took the threat seriously and security was stepped up for the next two shows. Presley went onstage with a Derringer in his right boot and a .45 pistol in his waistband, but the concerts went off without incident.

The album ''That's the Way It Is'', produced to accompany the documentary and featuring both studio and live recordings, marked a stylistic shift. As music historian John Robertson notes, "The authority of Presley's singing helped disguise the fact that the album stepped decisively away from the American-roots inspiration of the Memphis sessions towards a more middle-of-the-road sound. With country put on the back burner, and soul and R&B; left in Memphis, what was left was very classy, very clean white pop—perfect for the Las Vegas crowd, but a definite retrograde step for Elvis." After the end of his International engagement on September 7, Presley embarked on a week-long concert tour, largely of the South, his first since 1958. Another week-long tour, of the West Coast, followed in November.

On December 21, 1970, Presley engineered a meeting with President Richard Nixon at the White House, where he expressed his patriotism and his contempt for the hippie drug culture. He asked Nixon for a Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs badge, to add to similar items he had begun collecting and to signify official sanction of his patriotic efforts. Nixon, who apparently found the encounter awkward, expressed a belief that Presley could send a positive message to young people and that it was therefore important he "retain his credibility". Presley told Nixon that The Beatles, whose songs he regularly performed in concert during the era, exemplified what he saw as a trend of anti-Americanism and drug abuse in popular culture. (Presley and his friends had had a four-hour get-together with The Beatles five years earlier.) On hearing reports of the meeting, Paul McCartney later said that he "felt a bit betrayed. ... The great joke was that we were taking [illegal] drugs, and look what happened to him", a reference to Presley's death, hastened by prescription drug abuse.

The U.S. Junior Chamber of Commerce named Presley one of its annual Ten Most Outstanding Young Men of the Nation on January 16, 1971. Not long after, the City of Memphis named the stretch of Highway 51 South on which Graceland is located "Elvis Presley Boulevard". The same year, Presley became the first rock and roll singer to be awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award (then known as the Bing Crosby Award) by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, the Grammy Award organization. Three new, non-movie Presley studio albums were released in 1971, as many as had come out over the previous eight years. Best received by critics was ''Elvis Country'', a concept record that focused on genre standards. The biggest seller was ''Elvis Sings the Wonderful World of Christmas'', "the truest statement of all", according to Greil Marcus. "In the midst of ten painfully genteel Christmas songs, every one sung with appalling sincerity and humility, one could find Elvis tom-catting his way through six blazing minutes of 'Merry Christmas, Baby,' a raunchy old Charles Brown blues. ... If [Presley's] sin was his lifelessness, it was his sinfulness that brought him to life".

Marriage breakdown and ''Aloha from Hawaii''

MGM again filmed Presley in April 1972, this time for ''Elvis on Tour'', which went on to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Documentary Film that year. His gospel album ''He Touched Me'', released that month, would earn him his second Grammy Award, for Best Inspirational Performance. A 14-date tour commenced with an unprecedented four consecutive sold-out shows at New York's Madison Square Garden. The evening concert on July 10 was recorded and issued in LP form a week later. ''Elvis: As Recorded at Madison Square Garden'' became one of Presley's biggest-selling albums. After the tour, the single "Burning Love" was released—Presley's last top ten hit on the U.S. pop chart. "The most exciting single Elvis has made since 'All Shook Up'", wrote rock critic Robert Christgau. "Who else could make 'It's coming closer, the flames are now licking my body' sound like an assignation with James Brown's backup band?"

Presley and his wife, meanwhile, had become increasingly distant, barely cohabiting. In 1971, an affair he had with Joyce Bova resulted—unbeknownst to him—in her pregnancy and an abortion. He often raised the possibility of her moving in to Graceland, saying that he was likely to leave Priscilla. The Presleys separated on February 23, 1972, after Priscilla disclosed her relationship with Mike Stone, a karate instructor Presley had recommended to her. Priscilla relates that when she told him, Presley "grabbed ... and forcefully made love to" her, declaring, "This is how a real man makes love to his woman." Five months later, Presley's new girlfriend, Linda Thompson, a songwriter and one-time Memphis beauty queen, moved in with him. Presley and his wife filed for divorce on August 18. According to Joe Moscheo of the Imperials, the failure of Presley's marriage "was a blow from which he never recovered."

In January 1973, Presley performed two benefit concerts for the Kui Lee Cancer Fund in connection with a groundbreaking TV special, ''Aloha from Hawaii''. The first show served as a practice run and backup should technical problems affect the live broadcast two days later. Aired as scheduled on January 14, ''Aloha from Hawaii'' was the first global concert satellite broadcast, reaching approximately 1.5 billion viewers live and on tape delay. Presley's costume became the most recognized example of the elaborate concert garb with which his latter-day persona became closely associated. As described by Bobbie Ann Mason, "At the end of the show, when he spreads out his American Eagle cape, with the full stretched wings of the eagle studded on the back, he becomes a god figure." The accompanying double album, released in February, went to number one and eventually sold over 5 million copies in the United States. It proved to be Presley's last U.S. number one pop album during his lifetime.

At a midnight show the same month, four men rushed onto the stage in an apparent attack. Security men leapt to Presley's defense, and the singer's karate instinct took over as he ejected one invader from the stage himself. Following the show, he became obsessed with the idea that the men had been sent by Mike Stone to kill him. Though they were shown to have been only overexuberant fans, he raged, "There's too much pain in me ... Stone [must] die." His outbursts continued with such intensity that a physician was unable to calm him, despite administering large doses of medication. After another two full days of raging, Red West, his friend and bodyguard, felt compelled to get a price for a contract killing and was relieved when Presley decided, "Aw hell, let's just leave it for now. Maybe it's a bit heavy."

Health deterioration and death (1973–77)

Medical crises and last studio sessions

Presley's divorce took effect on October 9, 1973. He was now becoming increasingly unwell. Twice during the year he overdosed on barbiturates, spending three days in a coma in his hotel suite after the first incident. Toward the end of 1973, he was hospitalized, semicomatose from the effects of Demerol addiction. According to his main physician, Dr. George C. Nichopoulos, Presley "felt that by getting [drugs] from a doctor, he wasn't the common everyday junkie getting something off the street." Since his comeback, he had staged more live shows with each passing year, and 1973 saw 168 concerts, his busiest schedule ever. Despite his failing health, in 1974 he undertook another intensive touring schedule.

Presley's condition declined precipitously in September. Keyboardist Tony Brown remembers the singer's arrival at a University of Maryland concert: "He fell out of the limousine, to his knees. People jumped to help, and he pushed them away like, 'Don't help me.' He walked on stage and held onto the mike for the first thirty minutes like it was a post. Everybody's looking at each other like, Is the tour gonna happen?" Guitarist John Wilkinson recalled, "He was all gut. He was slurring. He was so fucked up. ... It was obvious he was drugged. It was obvious there was something terribly wrong with his body. It was so bad the words to the songs were barely intelligible. ... I remember crying. He could barely get through the introductions". Wilkinson recounted that a few nights later in Detroit, "I watched him in his dressing room, just draped over a chair, unable to move. So often I thought, 'Boss, why don't you just cancel this tour and take a year off...?' I mentioned something once in a guarded moment. He patted me on the back and said, 'It'll be all right. Don't you worry about it.'" Presley continued to play to sellout crowds. As cultural critic Marjorie Garber describes, he was now widely seen as a garish pop crooner: "in effect he had become Liberace. Even his fans were now middle-aged matrons and blue-haired grandmothers."

On July 13, 1976, Vernon Presley—who had become deeply involved in his son's financial affairs—fired "Memphis Mafia" bodyguards Red West (Presley's friend since the 1950s), Sonny West, and David Hebler, citing the need to "cut back on expenses". Presley was in Palm Springs at the time, and some suggest the singer was too cowardly to face the three himself. Another associate of Presley's, John O'Grady, argued that the bodyguards were dropped because their rough treatment of fans had prompted too many lawsuits. However, Presley's stepbrother David Stanley has claimed that the bodyguards were fired because they were becoming more outspoken about Presley's drug dependency. Presley and Linda Thompson split in November, and he took up with a new girlfriend, Ginger Alden. He proposed to Alden and gave her an engagement ring two months later, though several of his friends later claimed that he had no serious intention of marrying again.

RCA, which had enjoyed a steady stream of product from Presley for over a decade, grew anxious as his interest in spending time in the studio waned. After a December 1973 session that produced 18 songs, enough for almost two albums, he did not enter the studio in 1974. Parker sold RCA on another concert record, ''Elvis: As Recorded Live on Stage in Memphis''. Recorded on March 20, it included a version of "How Great Thou Art" that would win Presley his third and final competitive Grammy Award. (All three of his competitive Grammy wins—out of 14 total nominations—were for gospel recordings.) Presley returned to the studio in Hollywood in March 1975, but Parker's attempts to arrange another session toward the end of the year were unsuccessful. In 1976, RCA sent a mobile studio to Graceland that made possible two full-scale recording sessions at Presley's home. Even in that comfortable context, the recording process was now a struggle for him.

}} For all the concerns of his label and manager, in studio sessions between July 1973 and October 1976, Presley recorded virtually the entire contents of six albums. Though he was no longer a major presence on the pop charts, five of those albums entered the top five of the country chart, and three went to number one: ''Promised Land'' (1975), ''From Elvis Presley Boulevard, Memphis, Tennessee'' (1976), and ''Moody Blue'' (1977). The story was similar with his singles—there were no major pop hits, but Presley was a significant force in not just the country market, but on adult contemporary radio as well. Eight studio singles from this period released during his lifetime were top ten hits on one or both charts, four in 1974 alone. "My Boy" was a number one AC hit in 1975, and "Moody Blue" topped the country chart and reached the second spot on the AC in 1976. Perhaps his most critically acclaimed recording of the era came that year, with what Greil Marcus described as his "apocalyptic attack" on the soul classic "Hurt". "If he felt the way he sounded", Dave Marsh wrote of Presley's performance, "the wonder isn't that he had only a year left to live but that he managed to survive that long."

Final year and death

Journalist Tony Scherman writes that by early 1977, "Elvis Presley had become a grotesque caricature of his sleek, energetic former self. Hugely overweight, his mind dulled by the pharmacopoeia he daily ingested, he was barely able to pull himself through his abbreviated concerts." In Alexandria, Louisiana, the singer was on stage for less than an hour and "was impossible to understand". Presley failed to appear in Baton Rouge; he was unable to get out of his hotel bed, and the rest of the tour was cancelled. Despite the accelerating deterioration of his health, he stuck to most touring commitments. In Rapid City, South Dakota, "he was so nervous on stage that he could hardly talk", according to Presley historian Samuel Roy, and unable to "perform any significant movement." Guralnick relates that fans "were becoming increasingly voluble about their disappointment, but it all seemed to go right past Elvis, whose world was now confined almost entirely to his room and his spiritualism books." A cousin, Billy Smith, recalled how Presley would sit in his room and chat for hours, sometimes recounting favorite Monty Python sketches and his own past escapades, but more often gripped by paranoid obsessions that reminded Smith of Howard Hughes. "Way Down", Presley's last single issued during his lifetime, came out on June 6. His final concert was held in Indianapolis at the Market Square Arena, on June 26.

The book ''Elvis: What Happened?'', cowritten by the three bodyguards fired the previous year, was published on August 1. It was the first exposé to detail Presley's years of drug misuse. He was devastated by the book and tried unsuccessfully to halt its release by offering money to the publishers. By this point, he suffered from multiple ailments: glaucoma, high blood pressure, liver damage, and an enlarged colon, each aggravated—and possibly caused—by drug abuse.

Presley was scheduled to fly out of Memphis on the evening of August 16, 1977, to begin another tour. That afternoon, Alden discovered him unresponsive on his bathroom floor. Attempts to revive him failed, and death was officially pronounced at 3:30 pm at Baptist Memorial Hospital.

President Jimmy Carter issued a statement that credited Presley with having "permanently changed the face of American popular culture". Thousands of people gathered outside Graceland to view the open casket. One of Presley's cousins, Billy Mann, accepted $18,000 to secretly photograph the corpse; the picture appeared on the cover of the ''National Enquirer''s biggest-selling issue ever. Alden struck a $105,000 deal with the ''Enquirer'' for her story, but settled for less when she broke her exclusivity agreement. Presley left her nothing in his will.

Presley's funeral was held at Graceland, on Thursday, August 18. Outside the gates, a car plowed into a group of fans, killing two women and critically injuring a third. Approximately 80,000 people lined the processional route to Forest Hill Cemetery, where Presley was buried next to his mother. Within a few days, "Way Down" topped the country and UK pop charts. Following an attempt to steal the singer's body in late August, the remains of both Elvis Presley and his mother were reburied in Graceland's Meditation Garden on October 2.

Since 1977

Between 1977 and 1981, six posthumously released singles by Presley were top ten country hits. Graceland was opened to the public in 1982. Attracting over half a million visitors annually, it is the second most-visited home in the United States, after the White House. It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 2006.

Presley has been inducted into four music halls of fame: the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (1986), the Country Music Hall of Fame (1998), the Gospel Music Hall of Fame (2001), and the Rockabilly Hall of Fame (2007). In 1984, he received the W. C. Handy Award from the Blues Foundation and the Academy of Country Music's first Golden Hat Award. In 1987, he received the American Music Awards' Award of Merit.

A Junkie XL remix of Presley's "A Little Less Conversation" (credited as "Elvis Vs JXL") was used in a Nike advertising campaign during the 2002 FIFA World Cup. It topped the charts in over 20 countries, and was included in a compilation of Presley's number one hits, ''ELV1S'', that was also an international success. In 2003, a remix of "Rubberneckin'", a 1969 recording of Presley's, topped the U.S. sales chart, as did a 50th-anniversary re-release of "That's All Right" the following year. The latter was an outright hit in Great Britain, reaching number three on the pop chart.

In 2005, another three reissued singles, "Jailhouse Rock", "One Night"/"I Got Stung", and "It's Now or Never", went to number one in Great Britain. A total of 17 Presley singles were reissued during the year; all made the British top five. For the fifth straight year, ''Forbes'' named Presley the top-earning deceased celebrity, with a gross income of $45 million. He placed second in 2006, returned to the top spot the next two years, and ranked fourth in 2009. The following year, he was ranked second, with his highest annual income ever—$60 million—spurred by the celebration of his 75th birthday and the launch of Cirque du Soleil's ''Viva Elvis'' show in Las Vegas. In November 2010, ''Viva Elvis: The Album'' was released, setting his voice to newly recorded instrumental tracks. As of mid-2011, there were an estimated 15,000 licensed Presley products. He was again the second-highest-earning deceased celebrity.

Presley holds the records for most songs charting in ''Billboard''s top 40 and top 100: chart statistician Joel Whitburn calculates the respective totals as 104 and 151; Presley historian Adam Victor gives 114 and 138. Presley's rankings for top ten and number one hits vary depending on how the double-sided "Hound Dog/Don't Be Cruel" and "Don't/I Beg of You" singles, which precede the inception of ''Billboard''s unified Hot 100 chart, are analyzed. According to Whitburn, Presley holds the record for most top ten hits with 38; per ''Billboard''s current assessment, he ranks second with 36, behind Madonna's 37. Whitburn and ''Billboard'' concur that The Beatles hold the record for most number one hits with 20 and that Mariah Carey is second with 18. Whitburn has Presley also with 18 and thus tied for second; ''Billboard'' has him third with 17. Presley retains the record for cumulative weeks at number one: alone at 80, according to Whitburn and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame; tied with Carey at 79, according to ''Billboard''. He holds the records for most British number one hits, with 21, and top ten hits, with 76.

Musical style

Influences

Presley's earliest musical influence came from gospel. His mother recalled that from the age of two, at the Assembly of God church in Tupelo attended by the family, "he would slide down off my lap, run into the aisle and scramble up to the platform. There he would stand looking at the choir and trying to sing with them." In Memphis, Presley frequently attended all-night gospel singings at the Ellis Auditorium, where groups such as the Statesmen Quartet led the music in a style that, Guralnick suggests, sowed the seeds of Presley's future stage act: }} As a teenager, Presley's musical interests were wide-ranging, and he was deeply informed about African American musical idioms as well as white ones (see "Teenage life in Memphis"). Though he never had any formal training, he was blessed with a remarkable memory, and his musical knowledge was already considerable by the time he made his first professional recordings in 1954 at the age of 19. When Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller met him two years later, they were astonished at his encyclopedic understanding of the blues. At a press conference the following year, he proudly declared, "I know practically every religious song that's ever been written."

Genres

Presley was a central figure in the development of rockabilly, according to music historians. "Rockabilly crystallized into a recognizable style in 1954 with Elvis Presley's first release, on the Sun label", writes Craig Morrison. Paul Friedlander describes the defining elements of rockabilly, which he similarly characterizes as "essentially ... an Elvis Presley construction": "the raw, emotive, and slurred vocal style and emphasis on rhythmic feeling [of] the blues with the string band and strummed rhythm guitar [of] country". In "That's All Right", the Presley trio's first record, Scotty Moore's guitar solo, "a combination of Merle Travis–style country finger-picking, double-stop slides from acoustic boogie, and blues-based bent-note, single-string work, is a microcosm of this fusion."

At RCA, Presley's rock and roll sound grew distinct from rockabilly with group chorus vocals, more heavily amplified electric guitars and a tougher, more intense manner. While he was known for taking songs from various sources and giving them a rockabilly/rock and roll treatment, he also recorded songs in other genres from early in his career, from the pop standard "Blue Moon" at Sun to the country ballad "How's the World Treating You?" on his second LP to the blues of "Santa Claus Is Back In Town". In 1957, his first gospel record was released, the four-song EP ''Peace in the Valley''. Certified as a million seller, it became the top-selling gospel EP in recording history. Presley would record gospel periodically for the rest of his life. }} After his return from military service in 1960, Presley continued to perform rock and roll, but the characteristic style was substantially toned down. His first post-Army single, the number one hit "Stuck on You", is typical of this shift. RCA publicity materials referred to its "mild rock beat"; discographer Ernst Jorgensen calls it "upbeat pop". The modern blues/R&B; sound captured so successfully on ''Elvis Is Back!'' was essentially abandoned for six years until such 1966–67 recordings as "Down in the Alley" and "Hi-Heel Sneakers". The singer's output during most of the 1960s emphasized pop music, often in the form of ballads such as "Are You Lonesome Tonight?", a number one in 1960. While that was a dramatic number, most of what Presley recorded for his movie soundtracks was in a much lighter vein.

While Presley performed several of his classic ballads for the '68 Comeback Special, the sound of the show was dominated by aggressive rock and roll. He would record few new straight-ahead rock and roll songs thereafter; as he explained, they were "hard to find". A significant exception was "Burning Love", his last major hit on the pop charts. Like his work of the 1950s, Presley's subsequent recordings reworked pop and country songs, but in markedly different permutations. His stylistic range now began to embrace a more contemporary rock sound as well as soul and funk. Much of ''Elvis In Memphis'', as well as "Suspicious Minds", cut at the same sessions, reflected his new rock and soul fusion. In the mid-1970s, many of his singles found a home on country radio, the field where he first became a star.

Vocal style and range

Music critic Henry Pleasants observes that "Elvis Presley has been described variously as a baritone and a tenor. An extraordinary compass ... and a very wide range of vocal color have something to do with this divergence of opinion." He identifies Presley as a high baritone, calculating his range as two octaves and a third, "from the baritone low G to the tenor high B, with an upward extension in falsetto to at least a D-flat. Presley's best octave is in the middle, D-flat to D-flat, granting an extra full step up or down." In Pleasants' view, his voice was "variable and unpredictable" at the bottom, "often brilliant" at the top, with the capacity for "full-voiced high Gs and As that an opera baritone might envy." Scholar Lindsay Waters, who figures Presley's range as two and a quarter octaves, emphasizes that "his voice had an emotional range from tender whispers to sighs down to shouts, grunts, grumbles and sheer gruffness that could move the listener from calmness and surrender, to fear. His voice can not be measured in octaves, but in decibels; even that misses the problem of how to measure delicate whispers that are hardly audible at all." Presley was always "able to duplicate the open, hoarse, ecstatic, screaming, shouting, wailing, reckless sound of the black rhythm-and-blues and gospel singers," writes Pleasants, and also demonstrated a remarkable ability to assimilate many other vocal styles.

Questions over cause of death

"Drug use was heavily implicated" in Presley's death, writes Guralnick. "No one ruled out the possibility of anaphylactic shock brought on by the codeine pills ... to which he was known to have had a mild allergy." A pair of lab reports filed two months later each strongly suggested that polypharmacy was the primary cause of death; one reported "fourteen drugs in Elvis' system, ten in significant quantity." Forensic historian and pathologist Michael Baden views the situation as complicated: "Elvis had had an enlarged heart for a long time. That, together with his drug habit, caused his death. But he was difficult to diagnose; it was a judgment call."

The competence and ethics of two of the centrally involved medical professionals were seriously questioned. Before the autopsy was complete and toxicology results known, medical examiner Dr. Jerry Francisco declared the cause of death as cardiac arrhythmia, a condition that can be determined only in someone who is still alive. Allegations of a cover-up were widespread. While Presley's main physician, Dr. Nichopoulos, was exonerated of criminal liability for the singer's death, the facts were startling: "In the first eight months of 1977 alone, he had [prescribed] more than 10,000 doses of sedatives, amphetamines and narcotics: all in Elvis's name." His license was suspended for three months. It was permanently revoked in the 1990s after the Tennessee Medical Board brought new charges of over-prescription.

In 1994, the Presley autopsy was reopened. Coroner Dr. Joseph Davis declared, "There is nothing in any of the data that supports a death from drugs. In fact, everything points to a sudden, violent heart attack." Whether or not combined drug intoxication was in fact the cause, there is little doubt that polypharmacy contributed significantly to Presley's premature death.

Racial issues

When Dewey Phillips first aired "That's All Right" on Memphis radio, many listeners who contacted the station by phone and telegram to ask for it again assumed that its singer was black. From the beginning of his national fame, Presley expressed respect for African American performers and their music, and disregard for the norms of segregation and racial prejudice then prevalent in the South. Interviewed in 1956, he recalled how in his childhood he would listen to blues musician Arthur Crudup—the originator of "That's All Right"—"bang his box the way I do now, and I said if I ever got to the place where I could feel all old Arthur felt, I'd be a music man like nobody ever saw." ''The Memphis World'', an African American newspaper, reported that Presley, "the rock 'n' roll phenomenon", "cracked Memphis's segregation laws" by attending the local amusement park on what was designated as its "colored night". Such statements and actions led Presley to be generally hailed in the black community during the early days of his stardom. By contrast, many white adults, according to ''Billboard''s Arnold Shaw, "did not like him, and condemned him as depraved. Anti-negro prejudice doubtless figured in adult antagonism. Regardless of whether parents were aware of the Negro sexual origins of the phrase 'rock 'n' roll', Presley impressed them as the visual and aural embodiment of sex."

Despite the largely positive view of Presley held by African Americans, a rumor spread in mid-1957 that he had at some point announced, "The only thing Negroes can do for me is buy my records and shine my shoes." A journalist with the national African American weekly ''Jet'', Louie Robinson, pursued the story. On the set of ''Jailhouse Rock'', Presley granted him an interview, though he was no longer dealing with the mainstream press. He denied making such a statement or holding in any way to its racist view. Robinson found no evidence that the remark had ever been made, and on the contrary elicited testimony from many individuals indicating that Presley was anything but racist. Blues singer Ivory Joe Hunter, who had heard the rumor before he visited Graceland one evening, reported of Presley, "He showed me every courtesy, and I think he's one of the greatest." Though the rumored remark was wholly discredited at the time, it was still being used against Presley decades later. The identification of Presley with racism—either personally or symbolically—was expressed most famously in the lyrics of the 1989 rap hit "Fight the Power", by Public Enemy: "Elvis was a hero to most / But he never meant shit to me / Straight-up racist that sucker was / Simple and plain".

The persistence of such attitudes was fueled by resentment over the fact that Presley, whose musical and visual performance idiom owed much to African American sources, achieved the cultural acknowledgment and commercial success largely denied his black peers. Into the 21st century, the notion that Presley had "stolen" black music still found adherents. Notable among African American entertainers expressly rejecting this view was Jackie Wilson, who argued, "A lot of people have accused Elvis of stealing the black man's music, when in fact, almost every black solo entertainer copied his stage mannerisms from Elvis." And throughout his career, Presley plainly acknowledged his debt. Addressing his '68 Comeback Special audience, he said, "Rock 'n' roll music is basically gospel or rhythm and blues, or it sprang from that. People have been adding to it, adding instruments to it, experimenting with it, but it all boils down to [that]." Nine years earlier, he had said, "Rock 'n' roll has been around for many years. It used to be called rhythm and blues."

Influence of Colonel Parker and others

Parker and the Aberbachs

Once he became Presley's manager, Colonel Tom Parker insisted on exceptionally tight control over his client's career. Early on, he and his Hill and Range allies, the brothers Jean and Julian Aberbach, perceived the close relationship that developed between Presley and songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller as a serious threat to that control. Parker effectively ended the relationship, deliberately or not, with the new contract he sent Leiber in early 1958. Leiber thought there was a mistake—the sheet of paper was blank except for Parker's signature and a line on which to enter his. "There's no mistake, boy, just sign it and return it", Parker directed. "Don't worry, we'll fill it in later." Leiber declined, and Presley's fruitful collaboration with the writing team was over. Other respected songwriters lost interest in or simply avoided writing for Presley because of the requirement that they surrender a third of their usual royalties.

By 1967, Parker's contracts with Presley gave him 50 percent of most of the singer's earnings from recordings, films, and merchandise. Beginning in February 1972, he took a third of the profit from live appearances; a January 1976 agreement entitled him to half of that as well. Priscilla Presley noted that "Elvis detested the business side of his career. He would sign a contract without even reading it." Presley's friend Marty Lacker regarded Parker as a "hustler and a con artist. He was only interested in 'now money'—get the buck and get gone."

Lacker was instrumental in convincing Presley to record with Memphis producer Chips Moman and his handpicked musicians at American Sound Studio in early 1969. The American Sound sessions represented a significant departure from the control customarily exerted by Hill and Range. Moman still had to deal with the publisher's staff on site, whose song suggestions he regarded as unacceptable. He was on the verge of quitting, until Presley ordered the Hill and Range personnel out of the studio. Although RCA executive Joan Deary was later full of praise for the producer's song choices and the quality of the recordings, Moman, to his fury, received neither credit on the records nor royalties for his work.

Throughout his entire career, Presley performed in only three venues outside the United States—all of them in Canada, during brief tours there in 1957. Rumors that he would play overseas for the first time were fueled in 1974 by a million-dollar bid for an Australian tour. Parker was uncharacteristically reluctant, prompting those close to Presley to speculate about the manager's past and the reasons for his apparent unwillingness to apply for a passport. Parker ultimately squelched any notions Presley had of working abroad, claiming that foreign security was poor and the venues unsuitable for a star of his magnitude.

Parker arguably exercised tightest control over Presley's movie career. In 1957, Robert Mitchum asked Presley to costar with him in ''Thunder Road'', on which Mitchum was writer and producer. According to George Klein, one of his oldest friends, Presley was offered starring roles in ''West Side Story'' and ''Midnight Cowboy''. In 1974, Barbra Streisand approached Presley to star with her in the remake of ''A Star is Born''. In each case, any ambitions the singer may have had to play such parts were thwarted by his manager's negotiating demands or flat refusals. In Lacker's description, "The only thing that kept Elvis going after the early years was a new challenge. But Parker kept running everything into the ground." The operative attitude may have been summed up best by the response Leiber and Stoller received when they brought a serious film project for Presley to Parker and the Hill and Range owners for their consideration. In Leiber's telling, Jean Aberbach warned them to never again "try to interfere with the business or artistic workings of the process known as Elvis Presley".

Memphis Mafia

In the early 1960s, the circle of friends with whom Presley constantly surrounded himself until his death came to be known as the "Memphis Mafia". "Surrounded by the[ir] parasitic presence", as journalist John Harris puts it, "it was no wonder that as he slid into addiction and torpor, no-one raised the alarm: to them, Elvis was the bank, and it had to remain open." Tony Brown, who played piano for Presley regularly in the last two years of the singer's life, observed his rapidly declining health and the urgent need to address it: "But we all knew it was hopeless because Elvis was surrounded by that little circle of people ... all those so-called friends". In the Memphis Mafia's defense, Marty Lacker has said, "[Presley] was his own man. ... If we hadn't been around, he would have been dead a lot earlier."

Larry Geller became Presley's hairdresser in 1964. Unlike others in the Memphis Mafia, he was interested in spiritual questions and recalls how, from their first conversation, Presley revealed his secret thoughts and anxieties: "I mean there ''has'' to be a purpose...there's got to be a reason...why I was chosen to be Elvis Presley. ... I swear to God, no one knows how lonely I get. And how empty I really feel." Thereafter, Geller supplied him with books on religion and mysticism, which the singer read voraciously. Presley would be preoccupied by such matters for much of his life, taking trunkloads of books with him on tour.

Sex symbol

Presley's physical attractiveness and sexual appeal were widely acknowledged. "He was once beautiful, astonishingly beautiful", in the words of critic Mark Feeney. Television director Steve Binder, no fan of Presley's music before he oversaw the '68 Comeback Special, reported, "I'm straight as an arrow and I got to tell you, you stop, whether you're male or female, to look at him. He was that good looking. And if you never knew he was a superstar, it wouldn't make any difference; if he'd walked in the room, you'd know somebody special was in your presence." His performance style, as much as his physical beauty, was responsible for Presley's eroticized image. Writing in 1970, critic George Melly described him as "the master of the sexual simile, treating his guitar as both phallus and girl." In his Presley obituary, Lester Bangs credited him as "the man who brought overt blatant vulgar sexual frenzy to the popular arts in America." Ed Sullivan's declaration that he perceived a soda bottle in Presley's trousers was echoed by rumors involving a similarly positioned toilet roll tube or lead bar.

While Presley was marketed as an icon of heterosexuality, some cultural critics have argued that his image was ambiguous. In 1959, ''Sight and Sound''s Peter John Dyer described his onscreen persona as "aggressively bisexual in appeal". Brett Farmer places the "orgasmic gyrations" of the title dance sequence in ''Jailhouse Rock'' within a lineage of cinematic musical numbers that offer a "spectacular eroticization, if not homoeroticization, of the male image". In the analysis of Yvonne Tasker, "Elvis was an ambivalent figure who articulated a peculiar feminised, objectifying version of white working-class masculinity as aggressive sexual display."

Reinforcing Presley's image as a sex symbol were the reports of his dalliances with various Hollywood stars and starlets, from Natalie Wood in the 1950s to Connie Stevens and Ann-Margret in the 1960s to Candice Bergen and Cybill Shepherd in the 1970s. June Juanico of Memphis, one of Presley's early girlfriends, later blamed Parker for encouraging him to choose his dating partners with publicity in mind. Presley, however, never grew comfortable with the Hollywood scene, and most of these relationships were insubstantial.

Legacy

Presley's rise to national attention in 1956 transformed the field of popular music and had a huge effect on the broader scope of popular culture. As the catalyst for the cultural revolution that was rock and roll, he was central not only to defining it as a musical genre but in making it a touchstone of youth culture and rebellious attitude. With its racially mixed origins—repeatedly affirmed by Presley—rock and roll's occupation of a central position in mainstream American culture facilitated a new acceptance and appreciation of black culture. In this regard, Little Richard said of Presley, "He was an integrator. Elvis was a blessing. They wouldn't let black music through. He opened the door for black music." Al Green agreed: "He broke the ice for all of us." Presley also heralded the vastly expanded reach of celebrity in the era of mass communication: at the age of 21, within a year of his first appearance on American network television, he was one of the most famous people in the world.

Presley's name, image, and voice are instantly recognizable around the globe. He has inspired a legion of impersonators. In polls and surveys, he is recognized as one of the most important popular music artists and influential Americans. "Elvis Presley is the greatest cultural force in the twentieth century", said composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein. "He introduced the beat to everything and he changed everything—music, language, clothes. It's a whole new social revolution—the sixties came from it." Bob Dylan described the sensation of first hearing Presley as "like busting out of jail".

A ''New York Times'' editorial on the 25th anniversary of Presley's death observed, "All the talentless impersonators and appalling black velvet paintings on display can make him seem little more than a perverse and distant memory. But before Elvis was camp, he was its opposite: a genuine cultural force. ... Elvis's breakthroughs are underappreciated because in this rock-and-roll age, his hard-rocking music and sultry style have triumphed so completely." Not only Presley's achievements, but his failings as well, are seen by some cultural observers as adding to the power of his legacy, as in this description by Greil Marcus:

Elvis Presley is a supreme figure in American life, one whose presence, no matter how banal or predictable, brooks no real comparisons. ... The cultural range of his music has expanded to the point where it includes not only the hits of the day, but also patriotic recitals, pure country gospel, and really dirty blues. ... Elvis has emerged as a great ''artist,'' a great ''rocker,'' a great ''purveyor of schlock,'' a great ''heart throb,'' a great ''bore,'' a great ''symbol of potency,'' a great ''ham,'' a great ''nice person,'' and, yes, a great American.

Discography

A vast number of recordings have been issued under Presley's name. The total number of his original master recordings has been variously calculated as 665 and 711. His career began and he was most successful during an era when singles were the primary commercial medium for pop music. In the case of his albums, the distinction between "official" studio records and other forms is often blurred. For most of the 1960s, his recording career focused on soundtrack albums. In the 1970s, his most heavily promoted and best-selling LP releases tended to be concert albums. This summary discography lists only the albums and singles that reached the top of one or more of the following charts: the main U.S. ''Billboard'' pop chart; the ''Billboard'' country chart, the genre chart with which he was most identified (there was no country album chart before 1964); and the official British pop chart. In the United States, Presley also had five or six number one R&B; singles and seven number one adult contemporary singles; in 1964, his "Blue Christmas" topped the Christmas singles chart during a period when ''Billboard'' did not rank holiday singles in its primary pop chart. He also had number one hits in many countries beside the United States and United Kingdom.

Number one albums

Year	Album	Type	Chart positions
!style="width: 60px;"	!style="width: 60px;"	!style="width: 60px;"
	style="text-align:left;"	studio/comp.	1	n.a.	1
style="text-align:left;"	studio	1	n.a.	3
	style="text-align:left;"	sound./studio	1	n.a.	1
	studio	1	n.a.	2
		studio	2	n.a.	1
style="text-align:left;"	soundtrack	1	n.a.	1
		studio	1	n.a.	2
style="text-align:left;"	soundtrack	1	n.a.	1
1962	style="text-align:left;"	studio	4	n.a.	1
1964	style="text-align:left;"	soundtrack	1	—	12
1969		studio	13	2	1
1973		live	1	1	11
1974		compilation	43	1	20
1975	style="text-align:left;"	studio	47	1	21
1976		studio	41	1	29
		compilation	—	—	1
	studio/live	3	1	3
style="text-align:left;"	live	5	1	13
2002	style="text-align:left;"	compilation	1	1	1
2007		compilation	—	—	1

Number one singles

Year	Single	Chart positions
!style="width: 45px;"	!style="width: 45px;"	!style="width: 45px;"
		—	1	—
	1	1	2
	1	1	14
	1	1	2
style="text-align:left;"	1	1	2
style="text-align:left;"	1	3	11
	style="text-align:left;"	1	3	6
	1	1	1
style="text-align:left;"	1	1	3
style="text-align:left;"	1	1	1
	style="text-align:left;"	1	2	2
	1	2	2
	style="text-align:left;"	4/8	24/—	1
style="text-align:left;"	2/4	—	1
	1	—	4
	style="text-align:left;"	1	27	3
style="text-align:left;"	1	—	1
style="text-align:left;"	1	22	1
		—	—	1
style="text-align:left;"	1	—	1
style="text-align:left;"	4/5	—	1
		2/23	—	1
	1	—	1
	5	—	1
style="text-align:left;"	2	—	1
1963		3	—	1
1965		3	—	1
1969		1	—	2
1970		9	37	1
	style="text-align:left;"	31	1	6
	18	1	1
1981	style="text-align:left;"	28	1	43
2002	style="text-align:left;"	50	—	1
		—	—	1
	—	—	1
	—	—	1

Filmography

See also

Elvis Presley Enterprises

Honorific nicknames in popular music

List of artists by total number of UK number one singles

List of best-selling music artists

Personal relationships of Elvis Presley

Notes

Although some pronounce his surname "PREZ-lee", Presley himself used the pronunciation of the American South, "PRESS-lee", as did his family and those who worked with him. The correct spelling of his middle name has long been a matter of debate. The physician who delivered him wrote "Elvis Aaron Presley" in his ledger. The state-issued birth certificate reads "Elvis Aron Presley". The name was chosen after the Presleys' friend and fellow congregation member Aaron Kennedy, though a single-A spelling was probably intended by Presley's parents in order to parallel the middle name of Presley's stillborn brother, Jesse Garon. It reads Aron on most official documents produced during his lifetime, including his high school diploma, RCA record contract, and marriage license, and this was generally taken to be the proper spelling. In 1966, Presley expressed the desire to his father that the more traditional biblical rendering, Aaron, be used henceforth, "especially on legal documents." Five years later, the Jaycees citation honoring him as one of the country's Outstanding Young Men used Aaron. Late in his life, he sought to officially change the spelling to Aaron and discovered that state records already listed it that way. Knowing his wishes for his middle name, Aaron is the spelling his father chose for Presley's tombstone, and it is the spelling his estate has designated as official. According to a third cousin of Presley's, one of Gladys's great-grandmothers was Jewish. There is no evidence that Presley or his mother shared this belief in a Jewish heritage. Syndicated columnist Nate Bloom has challenged the cousin's account, which he calls a "tall tale". Of the $40,000, $5,000 covered back royalties owed by Sun. In 1956–57, Presley was also credited as a cowriter on several songs where he had no hand in the writing process: "Heartbreak Hotel"; "Don't Be Cruel"; all four songs from his first film, including the title track, "Love Me Tender"; "Paralyzed"; and "All Shook Up". He received credit on two other songs to which he did contribute: he provided the title for "That's Someone You Never Forget" (1961), written by his friend Red West; Presley and West collaborated with another friend, guitarist Charlie Hodge, on "You'll Be Gone" (1962). Whitburn follows actual ''Billboard'' history in considering the four songs on the "Don't Be Cruel/Hound Dog" and "Don't/I Beg of You" singles as distinct. He tallies each side of the former single as a number one (''Billboard''s sales chart had "Don't Be Cruel" at number one for five weeks, then "Hound Dog" for six) and reckons "I Beg of You" as a top ten, as it reached number eight on the old Top 100 chart. ''Billboard'' now considers both singles as unified items, ignoring the historical sales split of the former and its old Top 100 chart entirely. Whitburn thus analyzes the four songs as yielding three number ones and a total of four top tens. ''Billboard'' now states that they yielded just two number ones and a total of two top tens, voiding the separate chart appearances of "Hound Dog" and "I Beg of You". VH1 ranked Presley #8 among the "100 Greatest Artists of Rock & Roll" in 1998. The BBC ranked him as the #2 "Voice of the Century" in 2001. ''Rolling Stone'' placed him #3 in its list of "The Immortals: The Fifty Greatest Artists of All Time" in 2004. CMT ranked him #15 among the "40 Greatest Men in Country Music" in 2005. The Discovery Channel placed him #8 on its "Greatest American" list in 2005. ''Variety'' put him in the top ten of its "100 Icons of the Century" in 2005. ''The Atlantic Monthly'' ranked him #66 among the "100 Most Influential Figures in American History" in 2006. (1) The year given is the year the record first reached number one, rather than its original year of release. For instance, in 1974, ''Elvis' 40 Greatest'', a compilation on the budget Arcade label, was the fourth highest selling album of the year in the United Kingdom; at the time, the main British chart did not rank such compilations, relegating them to a chart for midpriced and TV-advertised albums, which ''Elvis' 40 Greatest'' topped for 15 weeks. The policy was altered in 1975, allowing the album to hit number one on the main chart in 1977, following Presley's death. (2) Before late 1958, rather than unified pop and country singles charts, ''Billboard'' had as many as four charts for each, separately ranking records according to sales, jukebox play, jockey spins (i.e., airplay), and, in the case of pop, a general Top 100. ''Billboard'' now regards the sales charts as definitive for the period. Widely cited chart statistician Joel Whitburn accords historical releases the highest ranking they achieved among the separate charts. Presley discographer Ernst Jorgensen refers only to the Top 100 chart for pop hits. All of the 1956–58 songs listed here as number one U.S. pop hits reached the top of both the sales and, with three exceptions, the Top 100 charts: "I Want You, I Need You, I Love You" (three), "Hound Dog" (two, behind its flip side, "Don't Be Cruel"), and "Hard Headed Woman" (two). (3) Several Presley singles reached number one in the United Kingdom as double A-sides; in the United States, the respective sides of those singles were ranked separately by ''Billboard''. Whitburn calculates a total of six number one R&B; singles, including "Don't Be Cruel", released as a double A-side with "Hound Dog"; ''Billboard''s Keith Caulfield excludes "Don't Be Cruel".

Citations

References

Further reading

Allen, Lew (2007). ''Elvis and the Birth of Rock''. Genesis. ISBN 1905662009.

Ann-Margret and Todd Gold (1994). ''Ann-Margret: My Story''. G.P. Putnam's Sons. ISBN 0399138919.

Cantor, Louis (2005). ''Dewey and Elvis: The Life and Times of a Rock 'n' Roll Deejay''. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 025202981X.

Dickerson, James L. (2001). ''Colonel Tom Parker: The Curious Life of Elvis Presley's Eccentric Manager''. Cooper Square Press. ISBN 0815412673.

Finstad, Suzanne (1997). ''Child Bride: The Untold Story of Priscilla Beaulieu Presley''. Harmony Books. ISBN 0517705850.

Goldman, Albert (1981). ''Elvis''. McGraw-Hill. ISBN 0070236577.

Goldman, Albert (1990). ''Elvis: The Last 24 Hours''. St. Martin's. ISBN 0312925417.

Klein, George (2010). ''Elvis: My Best Man: Radio Days, Rock 'n' Roll Nights, and My Lifelong Friendship with Elvis Presley''. Virgin Books. ISBN 9780307452740

Marcus, Greil (1999). ''Dead Elvis: A Chronicle of a Cultural Obsession''. Harvard University Press. ISBN 0674194225.

Marcus, Greil (2000). ''Double Trouble: Bill Clinton and Elvis Presley in a Land of No Alternative''. Picador. ISBN 057120676X.

Nash, Alanna (2010). ''Baby, Let's Play House: Elvis Presley and the Women Who Loved Him''. It Books. ISBN 0061699845.

West, Red, Sonny West, and Dave Hebler (as told to Steve Dunleavy) (1977). ''Elvis: What Happened?'' Bantam Books. ISBN 0345272153.

External links

Elvis Presley Enterprises official site of the Elvis Presley brand

Elvis The Music official record label site

Elvis Presley Interviews on officially sanctioned Elvis Australia site

Elvis Presley Ancestry at Genealogy.com

Elvis Presley 1955 interview material on ''Pop Chronicles''

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Name	Eva Cassidy
Background	solo_singer
Birth name	Eva Marie Cassidy
Birth date	February 02, 1963
Birth place	Washington, D.C., U.S.
Death date	November 02, 1996
Death place	Bowie, Maryland, U.S.
Origin	Maryland, United States
Instrument	Vocals, Guitar, Electric Guitar, Piano
Genre	Soul, Jazz, Blues, Folk, Gospel and Pop
Occupation	Landscaper, Painter, Singer, Guitarist
Years active	1981–1996
Label	Liaison (U.S.)Blix Street (U.S.)Hot (Europe)
Associated acts	Chuck Brown, Katie Melua
Website	www.evacassidy.org }}

Eva Marie Cassidy (February 2, 1963 – November 2, 1996) was an American vocalist known for her interpretations of jazz, blues, folk, gospel, country and pop classics. In 1992 she released her first album, ''The Other Side'', a set of duets with go-go musician Chuck Brown, followed by a live solo album, ''Live at Blues Alley'' in 1996. Although she had been honored by the Washington Area Music Association, she was virtually unknown outside her native Washington, D.C., when she died of melanoma (skin cancer) in 1996.

Four years later, Cassidy's music was brought to the attention of British audiences when her version of "Over the Rainbow" was played by Terry Wogan on BBC Radio 2. Following the overwhelming response, a camcorder recording of "Over the Rainbow", taken at Blues Alley in Washington, was shown on BBC Two's ''Top of the Pops 2''. Shortly afterwards, the compilation album ''Songbird'' climbed to the top of the UK Albums Charts, almost three years after its initial release. The chart success in the United Kingdom and Ireland led to increased recognition worldwide; her posthumously released recordings, including three UK number 1s, have sold more than ten million copies. Her music has also charted top 10 positions in Australia, Germany, Sweden, Norway and Switzerland.

Biography

Early life

Born on February 2, 1963, at the Washington Hospital Center, Cassidy grew up in Oxon Hill and later Bowie, Maryland, suburbs of Washington, D.C.. She was the third of four children born to Hugh and Barbara Cassidy. Her father, a retired teacher, sculptor, musician, Powerlifter and former army medic, is of Scottish and Irish descent, while her German-born mother was a horticulturist. From an early age, Cassidy displayed interest in art and music. When she was nine, her father taught her to play the guitar and she began to play and sing at family gatherings.

At age 11, Cassidy began singing and playing guitar in a Washington area band called Easy Street. This band performed in a variety of styles at weddings, corporate parties and pubs. Due to her shyness, she struggled with performing in front of strangers. While a student at Bowie High School, she sang with a local band called Stonehenge. During the summer of 1983, Cassidy sang and played guitar six days a week at the theme park Wild World. Her younger brother Dan, a fiddler, was also a member of this working band. She enrolled in art classes at a community college but dropped out after finding them unhelpful.

Throughout the 1980s, Cassidy worked with several other bands, including the techno-pop band Characters Without Names. During this period, Cassidy also worked as a propagator at a plant nursery and as a furniture painter. In her free time, she explored other artistic expressions including painting, sculpting and jewelry design. Despite holding a belief in God, Cassidy was not part of any organized religion.

Music career

In 1986, Cassidy was asked by Stonehenge guitarist and high school friend, David Lourim, to lend her voice to his music project, Method Actor. This brought her to Black Pond Studios, where she met bassist and recording engineer Chris Biondo. Biondo helped her find work as a session singer and later introduced her to Al Dale, who would become her manager. She sang back-ups for various acts, from go-go rhythm and blues band Experience Unlimited to rapper E-40. Biondo and Cassidy, who were in a romantic relationship for a time, formed the five-piece "Eva Cassidy Band" with Lenny Williams, Keith Grimes and Raice McLeod in 1990. They began to perform frequently in the Washington area.

In 1992, Biondo played a tape of Cassidy's voice for Chuck Brown, the "Godfather of go-go". It resulted in the duet album ''The Other Side'' featuring performances of classic songs such as "Fever", "God Bless the Child," and what would later become Cassidy's signature song, "Over the Rainbow". The album was released and distributed in 1992 by Liaison Records, the label that also released Brown's Go-go albums. Brown originally intended to record a single duet with Cassidy for his next solo album, but this was postponed due to ongoing negotiations between Dale and other labels for a solo deal. Cassidy's unwillingness to narrow her stylistic focus to one genre hindered her chances of securing a deal. After talks broke down, the two decided to record their own duet album. As a duo, they performed at the Columbia Arts Festival and opened for acts like Al Green and The Neville Brothers.

In 1993, Cassidy was honored by the Washington Area Music Association with a Wammie award for the ''Vocalist Jazz/Traditional'' category. The next year she was invited to perform at the event and chose to sing "Over the Rainbow". A ''Washington Times'' review of the event called her performance "a show-stopper". She took home two Wammies that night, again for ''Vocalist Jazz/Traditional'' and also for ''Roots Rock/Traditional R&B;''. For a brief period that year, Cassidy signed a deal with Blue Note Records to pair up with pop-jazz band Pieces of a Dream to release an album and tour the country. She sang two tracks in a mainly instrumental album. It was a musically unsatisfying experience for her.

After having a potential contract with Apollo Records collapse when the label went bankrupt, Biondo and Dale decided that she should release her own live album. In January 1996, the material for ''Live at Blues Alley'' was recorded over a two-day period at Blues Alley, Washington, D.C. Due to a technical glitch on the first night of recording, only the second night's recording was usable. Unhappy with the way she sounded due to a cold, she was reluctant to release the album. She eventually relented, on the condition that the studio track "Oh, Had I a Golden Thread", Cassidy's favorite song, would be included in the release, and that they start working on a follow-up studio album. Her apprehension appeared unfounded as local reviewers and the public responded positively. ''The Washington Post'' commented that "she could sing anything — folk, blues, pop, jazz, R&B;, gospel — and make it sound like it was the only music that mattered." The subsequent studio album she worked on was released as ''Eva by Heart'' posthumously in 1997. In the liner notes of ''Eva by Heart'', critic Joel E. Siegel described Cassidy as "one of the greatest voices of her generation."

Death

In 1993, Cassidy had a malignant mole removed from her back. Three years later, during a promotional event for the ''Live at Blues Alley'' album in July 1996, Cassidy noticed an ache in her hips, which she attributed to stiffness from painting murals while perched atop a stepladder. The pain persisted and a few weeks later, X-rays revealed that the melanoma had spread to her lungs and bones. Her doctors estimated she had three to five months to live. Cassidy opted for aggressive treatment, but her health deteriorated rapidly. In the early fall, at a benefit concert for her at the Bayou, she made her final public appearance, closing the set with "What a Wonderful World" in front of an audience of friends, fans and family. Additional chemotherapy was unavailing, and in six weeks she had died.

Cassidy died on November 2, 1996, at her family home in Bowie. She was 33. In accordance with her wishes, her body was cremated and the ashes were scattered on the lake shores of St. Mary's River Watershed Park, a nature reserve near California, Maryland.

Posthumous recognition

After Cassidy's death, local folk singer Grace Griffith introduced the Blues Alley recording to Bill Straw from her label, Blix Street Records. Straw approached the Cassidy family to put together a new album. In 1998, a compilation of tracks from Cassidy's three released recordings was assembled into the CD ''Songbird''. This CD lingered in relative obscurity for two years until being given airplay by Terry Wogan on his wide-reaching BBC Radio 2 show ''Wake Up to Wogan'', following recommendation by his producer Paul Walters. The album sold more than 100,000 copies in the following months. ''The New York Times'' spoke of her "silken soprano voice with a wide and seemingly effortless range, unerring pitch and a gift for phrasing that at times was heart-stoppingly eloquent."

Before Christmas of 2000, ''Top Of The Pops 2'' aired a video of Cassidy performing "Over the Rainbow", which resulted in ''Songbird'' climbing steadily up the UK charts over the next few weeks. Just as ITV's ''Tonight with Trevor McDonald'' aired a feature on Cassidy, the album topped the chart. Shot at Blues Alley by a friend with a camcorder the same night the album was recorded, the video became the most requested video ever shown on Top Of The Pops 2. "There's an undeniable emotional appeal in hearing an artist who you know died in obscurity singing a song about hope and a mystical world beyond everyday life", wrote ''The Guardian''. 250px|thumb|left|The camcorder recording of "Over the Rainbow" as shown on ''Top of the Pops 2'' Paul McCartney and Eric Clapton were among her new-found fans. Jazz critic Ted Gioia writes, "you might be tempted to write off the 'Cassidy sensation' [...] as a response to the sad story of the singer's abbreviated life rather than as a measure of her artistry. But don't be mistaken, Cassidy was a huge talent, whose obscurity during her lifetime was almost as much a tragedy as her early death." ''Songbird'' has since achieved significant chart success throughout Europe and six times platinum status in the UK. Although still relatively unknown in the United States at that time, the album would eventually be certified gold in the U.S. as well.

In May 2001, ABC's ''Nightline'' in the United States broadcast a well-received short documentary about Cassidy. Over the weekend, all five of Cassidy's albums occupied Amazon.com's best sellers list top spots. The Nightline episode has since been rebroadcast three times due to popular demand. Producer Leroy Sievers has said that it is "probably the most popular Nightline ever". In December, a nine-minute segment on NPR resulted in a similar sales surge, with five of the top seven spots going to Cassidy. A rebroadcast of the ''Tonight with Trevor McDonald'' feature on Cassidy in Britain also bumped up sales.

Since ''Songbird'', several other CDs with original material have been released: ''Time After Time'' (2000), ''Imagine'' (2002) and ''American Tune'' (2003). 2008 saw the release of another new album titled ''Somewhere''. Unlike previous albums, which consisted solely of cover songs, this release contains two original songs co-written by Cassidy. An acoustic album titled ''Simply Eva'' was released in January 2011.

Together with word of mouth and internet fansites, online commerce has played a big role in Cassidy's success. This point was further affirmed when in 2005, Amazon.com released a list of its top 25 best-selling musicians, which placed Cassidy in fifth position, behind The Beatles, U2, Norah Jones and Diana Krall, and far ahead of Elvis Presley and several other well-known stars.

In 2004, during the gala opening of the Bowie Center for the Performing Arts, the Bowie Regional Arts Vision Association, Inc. (BRAVA) dedicated the Star's Dressing Room to Eva. Following a moving tribute to Eva, Chuck Brown took the stage and performed his duet "with" Eva as her photos and video appeared in the background.

Unofficial recordings

A collection of previously unreleased studio recordings from 1987 to 1991, was released in 2000 as ''No Boundaries''. This release was not endorsed by the Cassidy family and was released under a different label. An allmusic review of the album stated that even "a gifted vocalist like Eva Cassidy can only do so much with bad material". In 2002, the self titled 1988 album by the band Method Actor, which featured Cassidy, was re-released by the band's guitarist and producer David Lourim with Cassidy's name displayed prominently on the cover. The Cassidy family and Blix Street Records filed a lawsuit against Lourim, claiming that Cassidy's name was used in a misleading fashion and that Blix Street has exclusive rights to her recordings. Lourim had Cassidy's written permission to release the album and eventually the cover was changed to look like the original LP album while already released copies were affixed with a sticker indicating that they are not solo Eva Cassidy albums.

A bootleg recording which has been in circulation is called ''Live at Pearl's''. It was recorded at Pearl's Restaurant in Annapolis, Maryland in 1994. Copies of the recording were circulated among friends and families after her death. Some of the songs on the recording are also on ''Imagine'' and ''American Tune''. Another recording, featuring Mick Fleetwood on drums and recorded at his restaurant in Alexandria, Virginia called Fleetwood's in the early 1990s, was in the possession of Niki Lee - the former wife of pianist Lenny Williams - who discovered it in her garage and attempted to sell it on eBay in 2008.

In popular media

In 2001, a book titled ''Songbird: Eva Cassidy: Her Story By Those Who Knew Her'', on the life and work of Cassidy based on interviews with close family and associates was released in the UK. The hardcover edition has since sold in excess of 100,000 copies. A U.S. edition published by Gotham Books was released in late 2003 and includes two additional chapters on her influences and success in the US. Her life story has also been adapted into a musical and also a Broadway piece for cancer benefit.

At the 2002 Winter Olympics gala, and later on tour, figure skater Michelle Kwan brought Cassidy's music to a new audience when she skated to a recording of "Fields of Gold". Kwan's part in exposing the music of Cassidy to the international and American public led Cassidy's label to present her a gold record from the certification of ''Songbird''. Subsequently, other figure skaters such as Kristi Yamaguchi, Sarah Hughes and Kimmie Meissner have used Cassidy's music in their routines.

Anglo-Georgian singer Katie Melua is a keen fan of Cassidy. Her debut album "Call Off the Search" contained the song "Faraway Voice", written in Cassidy's memory. Melua has also performed Cassidy's arrangement of "Anniversary Song" in concert. On Christmas Eve 2006, she performed alongside video footage of Cassidy singing ''Over The Rainbow'' on BBC One's "Duet Impossible". One year later, Cassidy's "What A Wonderful World" was spliced together with new vocals by Melua and released as a single exclusively at the British retail chain Tesco. It debuted at #1 on the UK Singles chart on December 16. All profits from the single went to the British Red Cross. Irish singer Chris de Burgh has stated that his song "Songbird" from his album ''The Road to Freedom'' was written in honour of Cassidy. Singer Mary Chapin Carpenter made reference to Cassidy in the song "My Heaven" on the album ''Between Here and Gone'': "More memories than my heart can hold, when Eva's singing 'Fields of Gold'."

In 2008, Cassidy's recording of "Autumn Leaves" was used by the Canadian National Professional Latin Champions, Andre and Natalie Paramonov, when they competed in America's Ballroom Challenge as finalists in the International Latin Competition.

The first film to feature an Eva Cassidy recording was ''Flight of Fancy'' starring Dean Cain. Since then her music has appeared in various film and TV series including the Dawson's Creek season four episode titled "The Graduate," ''Judging Amy'', ''Joe Somebody'', ''Love Actually'', ''Maid in Manhattan'', ''The Man From Elysian Fields'', ''Alpha Dog'' and ''Smallville''. Cassidy's arrangement of "Over the Rainbow" is a popular cover choice by singing competition contestants, with ''American Idol'' season 5 runner-up Katharine McPhee and ''The X Factor'' season 3 winner Leona Lewis among the singers. Her interpretation of "Imagine" has been performed by ''American Idol'' season 7 runner-up David Archuleta.

In March 2012, Sweden's Caroline Larsson and Bengt Magnusson released an album entitled ''A Tribute to Eva Cassidy''.

Possibility of future film

In late 2007, AIR Productions acquired the rights to produce a film based on Cassidy's life. It is being produced by Amy Redford (daughter of Robert Redford), Irwin Shapiro and Rick Singer. In an interview a year earlier, Cassidy's parents suggested Kirsten Dunst or Emily Watson as possible actresses who could play their daughter.

A documentary on the life, art and music of Cassidy entitled ''Eva's Song'' is expected to be in theaters February 2013.

Discography

Albums

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
		Liaison	Chuck Brown with Eva Cassidy.
''Live at Blues Alley''		Blix Street	Originally self-released under Eva Music in 1996.
''Eva by Heart''		Originally released under Liaison Records. Cassidy's only solo studio album.
		Compilation. UK #1, US (Pop Catalog) #1
	Renata/Brunswick
''Method Actor''		Blp	Reissue of a 1988 LP.
		Compilation.
''Simply Eva''		Blix Street

Singles

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
"Over the Rainbow"			UK #42 - Appeared in the charts between April and August 2001
"Take My Breath Away"			UK #54
"What a Wonderful World"		Dramatico	Posthumous duet with Katie Melua. UK #1
"Songbird"			UK #56

Bootleg

Title	Release date	Label	Notes
Live at Pearl's		align="center"
bootleg recording taped at Pearl's Restaurant in Annapolis, Maryland. Tracklist

Videography

Title	Release date	Format	Notes
Eva Cassidy Sings		PAL DVD (Region 2 and Region 4)

References

Notes

Books

''Johan Bakker: Behind the Rainbow, the tragic life of Eva Cassidy (2012)'' Omnibus Press, 207 pages, ISBN: 978-178038-231-9

External links

Eva Cassidy website maintained by her cousin, Laura Claire Bligh

Eva Cassidy Artwork website

Evasongs recordings information

[ Eva Cassidy] at the All Music Guide

Eva Cassidy on ABC Nightline

Eva Cassidy Feature on ABC Nightline

Eva Cassidy: Songbird: Her Story by Those Who Knew Her at Google Book Search

– Eva plays live, recorded on a friend's video camera — became the most requested video ever shown on Top Of The Pops 2. - ''Mary Ann Redmond & Eva Cassidy singing Eric Clapton's "Tears in Heaven"'' – From a 1995 performance at Fleetwood's in Alexandria, VA.

http://www.behindtherainbow.org Website Eva Cassidy Biography

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name	Rita Moreno
birth name	Rosita Dolores Alverío
birth date	December 11, 1931
birth place	Humacao, Puerto Rico
occupation	Actress, singer, dancer
years active	1950–present
spouse	Leonard Gordon (1965-2010; his death); 1 child}}

Rita Moreno (born December 11, 1931) is a Puerto Rican singer, dancer and actress. She is the only Hispanic and one of the few performers who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony, and was the second Puerto Rican to win an Academy Award.

Early years

Moreno was born Rosa Dolores Alverío in Humacao, Puerto Rico, to Rosa María, a seamstress, and Paco Alverío, a farmer. She moved with her mother to New York City at the age of five, and took the surname of her stepfather, Edward Moreno.

She began her first dancing lessons soon after arriving in New York from a friend of her mother, a Spanish dancer called Paco Cansino, who was the uncle of Rita Hayworth. When she was 11 years old, she lent her voice to Spanish language versions of American films.

She had her first Broadway role — as "Angelina" in ''Skydrift'' — by the time she was 13, which caught the attention of Hollywood talent scouts. She appeared in small roles in ''The Toast of New Orleans'' and ''Singin' in the Rain'', in which she played Zelda Zanners.

In March 1954, Moreno was featured on the cover of Life Magazine with a caption “Rita Moreno: An Actresses' Catalog of Sex and Innocence.”

In 1956, she had a supporting role in the film version of ''The King and I'' as Tuptim, but disliked most of her other work during this period.

''West Side Story'' and its Aftermath

In 1961, Moreno landed the role of Anita in Robert Wise's and Jerome Robbins' film adaptation of Leonard Bernstein's and Stephen Sondheim's groundbreaking Broadway musical, ''West Side Story'', which was played by Chita Rivera on Broadway. Moreno won the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for that role.

After winning the Oscar, Moreno thought she would be able to continue to perform less stereotypical film roles, but was disappointed.

"Ha, ha. I showed them. I didn't make another movie for seven years after winning the Oscar.... Before West Side Story I was always offered the stereotypical Latina roles. The Conchitas and Lolitas in westerns. I was always barefoot. It was humiliating, embarrassing stuff. But I did it because there was nothing else. After ''West Side Story'', it was pretty much the same thing. A lot of gang stories."

Moreno went on to be the first Hispanic to win an Emmy (1977), a Grammy (1972), an Oscar (1962) and a Tony (1975). In 1985, she won the Sarah Siddons Award for her work in Chicago..

Other roles

Besides appearing in ''Singin' in the Rain'', ''The King and I'', ''Summer and Smoke'' (1961), ''West Side Story'', ''The Night of the Following Day'' (1968) and ''Carnal Knowledge'' in (1971),

Moreno appeared on the PBS children's series ''The Electric Company'' in the 1970s, most notably as Millie the Helper. In fact, it was Moreno who screamed the show's opening line, "HEY, YOU GUYS!" She also had roles as the naughty little girl Pandora, and as "Otto", the ''very'' short-tempered director. Moreno appeared in the family variety series ''The Muppet Show'', and she made other guest appearances on television series such as ''The Rockford Files'', ''The Love Boat'', ''The Cosby Show'', ''George Lopez'', ''The Golden Girls'', and ''Miami Vice''. She was also a regular on the short-lived sitcom version of ''Nine to Five'' (based on the film hit) during the early 1980s.

Broadway and television

Moreno's Broadway credits include ''The Last of the Red Hot Lovers'', ''Gantry'', ''The Ritz'', for which she won the 1975 Tony Award for Best Featured Actress, and the female version of ''The Odd Couple''. In 1993 she was invited to perform at President Bill Clinton's inauguration and later that month was asked to perform at the White House. During the mid 1990s, Moreno provided the voice of Carmen Sandiego on the animated Fox show ''Where on Earth is Carmen Sandiego?'' In 1995, she co-starred with Charlton Heston, Mickey Rooney, Deborah Winters and Peter Graves in the Warren Chaney docudrama, ''America: A Call to Greatness''.

In the late 1990s, she gained exposure to a new generation of viewers when she played Sister Pete, a nun trained as a psychologist in the popular HBO series, ''Oz''. She made a guest appearance on ''The Nanny'' as Coach Stone, Maggie's (Nicholle Tom) tyrannical gym teacher, whom Fran Fine (Fran Drescher) also remembered from her school as Ms. Wickavich.

Performing in the 21st century

Moreno continues to be active on stage and screen. In 2006, she portrayed Amanda Wingfield in Berkeley Repertory Theatre's revival of ''The Glass Menagerie''. She was seen on ''Law and Order: Criminal Intent'' as the dying mother of Detective Goren. She was a regular on the short-lived TV series ''Cane'', which starred Jimmy Smits and Hector Elizondo. In 2011 she accepted the role of the mother of Fran Drescher's character in the TV sitcom ''Happily Divorced''.

In September 2011, Moreno began performing a solo autobiographical show at the Berkeley Rep (theater) in Berkeley, California, ''Rita Moreno: Life Without Makeup'' written by Berkeley Rep artistic director Tony Taccone after hours of interviews with Moreno.

Family and Personal Life

Moreno dated Marlon Brando for 8 years, and attempted suicide in his home in 1962.

On June 18, 1965, Moreno married Leonard Gordon, a cardiologist who was also her manager. He died on June 30, 2010. They have one daughter, Fernanda Luisa Gordon-Fisher, and two grandsons, Justin and Cameron Fisher.

Awards

Among Moreno's awards and recognitions are the following:

Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress - "West Side Story" (1961)

Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - "West Side Story" (1961)

"The Joseph Jefferson Award" Best Chicago Theatre Actress (1968)

Grammy Award The Electric Company Album (1972)

Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play - "The Ritz" (1975)

Emmy Award for Individual Performance in a Variety or Music Program (1977)

Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actress - Drama Series (1978)

"The Golden Apple" Cue Magazine Award

Library of Congress Living Legends Award, April 2000

In 2000, the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA) renamed their Award for Excellence in her honor (now named HOLA Rita Moreno Award for Excellence)

"The Sarah Siddons Awards" for her portrayal of Olive Madison in the female version of the Odd Couple

"Special Recognition Award" from the International Latin Music Hall of Fame (2001)

"Presidential Medal of Freedom" from President George W. Bush in June 2004

Rita Moreno has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7083 Hollywood Blvd.

On December 5, 2007, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and First Lady Maria Shriver inducted Moreno into the California Hall of Fame, located at The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts. In 2009, Rita Moreno was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Barack Obama.

In 2010, the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA) honored her with an HOLA Lifetime Achievement Award

Filmography

Film

! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1950	''So Young So Bad''	Dolores Guererro	as Rosita Moreno
1950	''''	Tina
1950	''Pagan Love Song''	Terru
1952		Lucy Gomez
1952		Zelda Zanders
1952	''''	Manuela Rodríguez
1952	''Cattle Town''	Queli
1953	''Fort Vengeance''	Bridget Fitzgibbon
1953		Soubrette	uncredited
1953		Christina
1953	''''	Jara
1954	''Jivaro''	Maroa
1954	''''	Honey Bear
1954	''Garden of Evil''	Cantina Singer
1955	''Untamed''	Julia
1955		Ula
1956	''''	Sandra Roberts
1956	''''	Tuptim
1956	''''	Huguette
1957	''''	Hetty Hutter
1960	''This Rebel Breed''	Lola Montalvo
1961		Anita
1961		Rosa Zacharias
1963	''Cry of Battle''	Sisa
1968	''''	Vi
1969	''Popi''	Lupe
1969		Dolores Gonzáles
1971		Louise
1976	''''	Googie Gomez
1977	''Voodoo Passion''
1978	''''	Esther Rose
1980	''Happy Birthday, Gemini''	Lucille Pompi
1981	''''	Claudia Zimmer
1991	''Age Isn't Everything''	Rita
1993	''Italian Movie''	Isabella
1994		Rosaria Linares
1995	''Carmen Miranda: Bananas Is My Business''	Herself	documentary
1995		Madame Rulenska
1995	''America: A Call to Greatness''	Herself	docudrama
1998	''Slums of Beverly Hills''	Belle Abromowitz	Nominated — ALMA Award for Outstanding Actress in a Feature Film in a Crossover Role
1999	''Carlo's Wake''	Angela Torello
1999	''''	Herself	documentary
2000	''Blue Moon''	Maggie
2001	''Piñero''	Miguel's Mother
2003	''Casa de los Babys''	Señora Muñoz
2003	''Beyond Borders: John Sayles in Mexico''	Herself	documentary
2004	''King of the Corner''	Inez
2006	''Play It By Ear''	Ruth

Television

! Year	! Title	! Role	Notes
1958	''Father Knows Best''	Chanthini	Episode: ''Fair Exchange'' (24 November 1958)
1971–77	''''	Carmela Otto The DirectorPandora the Little Girl, Millie the Helper	780 episodes
1974	''Dominic's Dream''	Anita Bente
1974		Various	Nominated — Emmy Award for Outstanding Continuing or Single Performance by a Supporting Actress in Variety or Music
1976	''''	Herself
1978	''''	Rita Capkovic
1979	''Anatomy of a Seduction''	Nina
1979	''''	Herself/Host	Special
1981	''Evita Perón''	Renata Riguel
1982–83		Violet Newstead
1982		Waitress
1982	''Portrait of a Showgirl''	Rosella DeLeon	Nominated — Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie
1986	''Golden Girls''	Renee	Episode: "Empty Nest"
1987	''''	Mrs. Granger	Episode: "You Only Hurt the One You Love"
1989–90	''B.L. Stryker''	Kimberly Baskin	2 episodes
1994	''''	Miss Wickervich/Mrs. Stone	Episode: "The Gym Teacher"
1994–98		Carmen Sandiego	voice
1994–95	''''	Angie Corea	2 episodes
1995	''''	Mom
1997–2003		Sister Peter Marie Reimondo
1998	''''	Irma Kelly
1999	''Resurrection''	Mimi
2004	''Copshop''	Mary Alice
2005	''Law & Order: Special Victims Unit''	Mildred Quintana	Episode: "Night"
2005	''Law & Order: Trial by Jury''	Mildred Quintana	Episode: "Day"
2006–07	''Law & Order: Criminal Intent''	Frances Goren	3 episodes: "Endgame"; "The War at Home" and "Brother's Keeper"
2007	''''	Luisa Diaz	Episode: "George Testi-Lies for Benny"
2007	''Ugly Betty''	Aunt Mirta	Episode: "A Tree Grows in Guadalajara"
2007		Amalia Duque	13 episodes
2011	''Happily Divorced''	Dori

See also

List of famous Puerto Ricans

List of Puerto Ricans in the Academy Awards

List of people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award

References

External links

Rita Moreno Downstage Center XM Radio interview by the American Theatre Wing, January 2007, March 2007.

Rita Moreno's interview for the Archive of American Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

TonyAwards.com Interview with Rita Moreno

Category:1931 births Category:Living people Category:American female singers Category:American film actors Category:American musical theatre actors Category:American stage actors Category:American television actors Category:Best Supporting Actress Academy Award winners Category:Best Supporting Actress Golden Globe (film) winners Category:Emmy Award winners Category:Grammy Award winners Category:People from Humacao, Puerto Rico Category:Presidential Medal of Freedom recipients Category:Puerto Rican actors Category:Puerto Rican female singers Category:Tony Award winners Category:United States National Medal of Arts recipients Category:Hispanic and Latino American actors

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