Look up Fiona in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Fiona is a feminine given name. The name Fiona was invented, and first used, by the Scottish poet James Macpherson^{[citation needed]} (1736–96), author of the Ossian poems, which he claimed were translations from ancient Gaelic sources (sources, when challenged, he never produced). The name was subsequently used as a pseudonym by William Sharp (1855–1905), who authored several romantic works under the name "Fiona Macleod". The name has since become popular in England, Scotland and Ireland.^[1]

The name is considered to be a Latinised form of the Gaelic word fionn, meaning "white", "fair". The name Fiona is also sometimes used as an Anglicisation of the Irish language name Fíona.^[1] There is also a modern tendency to equate the authentic Scottish Gaelic feminine name Fionnghal with Fiona^[2] (note that it is possible that Fiona may have been based on Fionnghal).^[1]

The name Fiona is rising in popularity particularly in German-speaking countries. Fiona was the 49th most popular name for baby girls born in 2008 in Germany.^[3] Fiona was tied for third place in the ranking of most popular names for baby girls born in the tiny principality of Liechtenstein in 2008.^[4] The name was the 347th most popular name for girls born in the United States in 2008, where it has ranked among the top 1,000 most popular names for girls since 1990 and among the top 500 since 1999.^[5] The name Fiona has been particularly popular for girls of Asian or Pacific Islander descent in New York City, where Fiona ranked as the ninth most popular name for girls from those groups in 2007.^[6]

Real people with this name[link]

• Fiona, singer, born Fiona Flanagan
• Fiona Apple, singer
• Fiona Bruce, BBC presenter
• Fiona Fairhurst, inventor of the Speedo Fastskin swimsuit
• Fiona Gubelmann, American actress
• Fiona Hammond, Australian water polo player
• Fiona MacGillivray, Canadian singer
• Fiona Mackenzie, Scottish Gaelic Singer
• Fiona Mactaggart, British politician
• Fiona May, English athlete
• Fiona Millar, British author and journalist
• Fiona O'Donnell, Scottish politician
• Fiona O'Driscoll, Irish camogie player
• Fiona O'Loughlin, Australian stand-up comedian
• Fiona O'Malley, Irish politician
• Fiona O'Shaughnessy, Irish actor
• Fiona O'Sullivan, Irish footballer
• Fiona Phillips, British journalist and broadcaster
• Fiona Ritchie, American broadcaster
• Fiona Robinson, Australian basketball and handball player
• Fiona Shaw, Irish actress
• Fiona Staples, Comic Book Artist
• Fiona Sit, Hong Kong Cantonese singer
• Fiona Xie, Singaporean television actress
• Julia Roberts, American actress born "Julia Fiona Roberts"
• Kim Hill, New Zealand broadcaster also known as Fiona

Fictional characters[link]

• Fiona Belli, protagonist in the game Haunting Ground
• Fiona Carter in the BBC show Spooks
• Fiona "Fee" Cleary, matriarch of the Cleary family in the novel and mini-series The Thorn Birds
• Fiona Conneely, main character in The Secret of Roan Inish
• Fiona Coyne in the Canadian television series Degrassi: The Next Generation
• Fiona Flagstaff, character/spinosaurus in Dino Squad
• Fiona Fox in the Sonic the Hedgehog comic books by Archie Comics
• Fiona Gallagher in the television drama Shameless
• Fiona Glenanne in the television show Burn Notice
• Fiona Hackworth in the book The Diamond Age
• Fiona Elisi Linette in the anime series Zoids
• Fiona McLaren, the main female character in the Broadway musical Brigadoon
• Fiona Volpe, an assassin in the film Thunderball
• Princess Fiona in the film Shrek and its sequels
• Princess Fiona, sorceress in the Chronicles of Amber novels
• Fiona in Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
• Fiona, stepmother of Sam Montgomery in the 2004 film A Cinderella Story
• Fiona in the movie Eurotrip
• Fiona, main character in television series So Weird
• Fiona in Lois Lowry's novel The Giver
• Fiona, main character in the film Josie and the Pussycats
• Fiona in Kid vs. Kat
• Fiona, a playable character in the Free-to-play game Vindictus
• Fiona Cat, Huckle Cat's mother from The Busy World of Richard Scarry

See also[link]

• List of Irish-language given names
• Tropical Storm Fiona - a 2010 Atlantic storm
• Fiona pinnata, marine mollusc, only member of the genus Fiona and family Fionidae

Notes[link]

This page or section lists people that share the same given name. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change that link to point directly to the intended article.

Fiona Apple
Apple performing in Seattle in 2006
Background information
Birth name	Fiona Apple McAfee Maggart
Born	(1977-09-13) September 13, 1977 (age 34) Manhattan, New York, United States
Origin	New York City, New York
Genres	Piano rock, baroque pop, alternative rock, experimental rock, jazz
Occupations	Singer-songwriter, musician
Instruments	Vocals, piano, optigan
Years active	1996–present
Labels	Epic
Website	Fiona-Apple.com

Fiona Apple McAfee Maggart (born September 13, 1977) is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. Apple met international acclaim for her 1996 debut album, Tidal, which was a critical and commercial success. At the age of nineteen she received a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance for the single "Criminal" from that album in 1998.

After Tidal, Apple released the critically acclaimed, though less commercially successful albums, When the Pawn... (1999) and Extraordinary Machine (2005). A perceived shelving of Extraordinary Machine was met with vocal protests from her fans, who campaigned against her record label in 2005. Apple's musical style contains elements of jazz and alternative rock.

Early life and family[link]

Born in New York City, Apple is the daughter of singer Diane McAfee and actor Brandon Maggart. Her older sister, Amber, sings cabaret under the stage name Maude Maggart. Her half brother Spencer is a director and directed the video for her single "Parting Gift." Her half brother Garett Maggart starred in the TV series The Sentinel. In addition, her maternal grandparents were Millicent Green, a dancer with the George White's Scandals, a series of 1920s musical revues similar to the Ziegfeld Follies, and Johnny McAfee, a multireedist and vocalist of the big band era; her grandparents met while touring with Johnny Hamp and his orchestra. Apple was raped at the age of twelve, a trauma she would later allude to in songs such as "Sullen Girl."^[1][2]

Career[link]

[edit] 1994–1998: Career beginnings and Tidal

Apple was introduced to the music industry in 1994, when she gave a demo tape containing the songs "Never Is a Promise," "Not One of Those Times," and "He Takes a Taxi" to her friend who was the babysitter of music publicist Kathryn Schenker.^[1] Schenker then passed the tape along to Sony Music executive Andy Slater.^[3] Apple's contralto voice, piano skills and lyrics captured his attention, and Slater signed her to a record deal.^[4][5]

In 1996, Apple's debut album, Tidal, was released by Work. The album sold 2.7 million copies and was certified three times platinum in the U.S.^[6][7] "Criminal," the third single, became a hit and the song reached the top forty on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100. The song's controversial Mark Romanek-directed music video — in which a scantily clad Apple appeared in a 1970s-era tract house — played on MTV. Apple later said: "I decided if I was going to be exploited, then I would do the exploiting myself."^[8] Other singles from Tidal included "Shadowboxer," "Sleep to Dream," and "Never Is a Promise." In 1997, while accepting MTV Video Music Award for "Best New Artist" for her song Sleep to Dream, Apple said: "This world is bullshit, and you shouldn't model your life on what we think is cool, and what we're wearing and what we're saying."^[9] The New Yorker and NYRock characterized her MTV award show speech as ungrateful and "ridiculous."^[1][4] Apple was unapologetic. "I just had something on my mind and I just said it. And that's really the foreshadowing of my entire career and my entire life. When I have something to say, I'll say it," she said, responding to these criticisms in an article in Rolling Stone in January, 1998.^[10]

During this period, Apple also made recordings of The Beatles' "Across the Universe" and Percy Mayfield's "Please Send Me Someone to Love" for the soundtrack of the film Pleasantville. She later canceled the last twenty-one dates on a tour in support of her album due to "personal family problems."^[11]

[edit] 1999–2002: When the Pawn... and hiatus

Apple's second album, When the Pawn..., was released in 1999. Its full title is a poem Apple wrote after reading letters that appeared in Spin regarding an article that had cast her in a negative light in an earlier issue.^[12] The title's length earned it a spot in the Guinness Book of Records for 2001. However, as of October, 2007, it is no longer the longest album title, as Soulwax released Most of the Remixes, a remix album whose title surpasses When the Pawn’s length by 100 characters.^[13] When the Pawn was cultivated during Apple's relationship with film director Paul Thomas Anderson. When the Pawn, which was produced by Jon Brion, used more expressive lyrics, experimented more with drum loops, and incorporated both the Chamberlin and drummer Matt Chamberlain.^[14] The album received a positive reception from publications such as The New York Times and Rolling Stone. It did not fare as well commercially as her debut, though it was an RIAA-certified platinum album^[6] and sold one million copies in the U.S.^[7] The album's lead single, "Fast as You Can," reached the top twenty on Billboard's Modern Rock Tracks chart and became Apple's first Top 40 hit in the UK. The videos for two follow-up singles, "Paper Bag" and "Limp" (directed by then-boyfriend Anderson), received very little play.

After performing for forty minutes in a set hampered by equipment issues to 3,000 fans at the New York City Roseland Ballroom, a frustrated Apple left the stage without returning. Her performance saw Apple appearing distraught at the sound quality, apologizing numerous times for the sound and crying.^[15] The incident was described by AOL as "music's most infamous on-stage meltdown."^[16] After completing a concert tour in support of her second album in 2000, Apple relocated to Los Angeles. During her hiatus, Apple contemplated retiring from her recording career. Apple sang with Johnny Cash on a cover of Simon & Garfunkel's "Bridge over Troubled Water" that ended up on his album American IV: The Man Comes Around and was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Country Collaboration with Vocals." She also collaborated with Cash on Cat Stevens's "Father and Son," which was included in his 2003 collection Unearthed.

[edit] 2002–2010: Extraordinary Machine and second hiatus

Fans in support of Fiona Apple demonstrating outside the NYC headquarters of Sony BMG Music Entertainment in January 2005.

Apple's third album, Extraordinary Machine, was originally produced by Jon Brion. In spring 2002, Apple and Jon Brion, her longtime friend and producer on When the Pawn, met for their weekly lunch meeting. Brion reportedly "begged" Apple to make another album. Apple agreed, and Brion went to Apple's label, Epic Records, with strict stipulations (including no deadline), which the label eventually agreed to. Recording sessions began in 2002, at Ocean Way studios in Nashville, Tennessee, but later moved to the Paramour Mansion in Los Angeles. Work on the album continued until 2003, and in May of that year it was submitted to Sony executives. In 2004 and 2005, tracks were leaked on the Internet in MP3 format and played on U.S. and international radio. Subsequently, MP3s of the entire album went online. Although a Web site distributing the album was quickly taken offline, it soon reached P2P networks and was downloaded by fans.^[17][18] A fan-led campaign supported the album's official release.

Mike Elizondo, who had previously played bass on Pawn, was brought back as co-producer to complete the tracks he had begun with Brion and Apple. Spin later reported the following: "Fans erroneously thought that Apple's record label, Epic, had rejected the first version of Extraordinary Machine... in reality, according to Elizondo, Apple was unhappy with the results, and it was her decision to redo the record, not her label's."^[19] In August, 2005, the album was given an October release date.^[18] Production had been largely redone "from scratch" by Elizondo and was co-produced by Brian Kehew. Two of the eleven previous leaked tracks were relatively unchanged, and one new song was also included.^[20] Despite suggestions that the album had caused a rift between Brion and Apple, they regularly perform together at Largo, a club in Los Angeles, including a joint appearance with Elizondo on bass just before the news broke of an official release.^[21] Extraordinary Machine debuted at number seven and was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Pop Vocal Album". It was eventually certified gold^[6] and sold 462,000 copies in the U.S., though its singles ("Parting Gift," "O' Sailor," "Not About Love" and "Get Him Back") failed to enter any Billboard charts.^[22] Apple went on a live tour to promote the album in late 2005.

Apple on tour with Nickel Creek in 2007

In June, 2006, Apple appeared on the joke track "Come Over and Get It (Up in 'Dem Guts)" by comedian Zach Galifianakis. Galifianakis previously appeared in the music video for Apple's "Not About Love."^[23] Apple recorded a cover of "Sally's Song" for the 2006 special edition release of the soundtrack for the Tim Burton film The Nightmare Before Christmas. In May, 2006, Apple paid tribute to Elvis Costello on VH1's concert series Decades Rock Live, by performing Costello's hit "I Want You." Her version was subsequently released as a digital single.^{[24][dead link]} Apple toured the East Coast during August, 2007, with Nickel Creek.^[25][26] In 2008, Apple recorded a duet titled "Still I" with Christophe Deluy. In 2009, Apple covered "Why Try to Change Me Now" and "I Walk A Little Faster" for The Best Is Yet to Come - The Songs of Cy Coleman. In January, 2010, Fiona Apple and Jon Brion performed together at "Love and Haiti, Too: A Music Benefit," a charity concert for the people hurt by the Haiti earthquake. Fiona sang a cover of "(S)he's Funny That Way," composed by Neil Moret, lyrics by Richard Whiting, which is often associated with the singer Billie Holiday. In June, 2010, Fiona released a song titled "So Sleepy," produced by Jon Brion and written by children involved with the non-profit organization 826LA. The song will be included on a compilation album released by the organization titled Chickens in Love. Apple collaborated with Margaret Cho on her album Cho Dependent, which was released on August 24, 2010.^[27]

[edit] 2011-present: The Idler Wheel...

The Idler Wheel is wiser than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords will serve you more than Ropes will ever do,^[28][29] Apple's fourth studio album will be released on June 19, 2012 in the US. The international release date has yet to be finalized.^[30] In late 2010, Billboard published an article stating that Apple was planning on releasing a new album in spring 2011, with musician Michelle Branch claiming to have heard some of the new tracks.^[31] Drummer Charley Drayton also told Modern Drummer magazine that he was co-producing the record.^[32] However, the album was not released in the spring and Billboard reported later that year that there was no record.^[33] On November 23, 2011, a music blog quoted an exchange between Apple and a member of the audience at the Largo Coronet in Los Angeles who requested she perform new material. She reportedly replied "I can't remember [how to play] any of my new songs because they've been done for a fucking year."^[34] In January 2012, after its new record label head, LA Reid hinted at new music from Apple, Epic Records announced that the album would be released later in the year.^[35] Apple announced performances at the South by Southwest Festival and a spring 2012 tour soon after.^[36]

Personal life[link]

Fiona has been dating writer and actor Jonathan Ames since 2007.^[37] As of March 2012, they remained together.^[38] In the mid-1990s, Apple dated magician David Blaine.^[39] Afterward, Apple was romantically linked to director Paul Thomas Anderson.^[40] Anderson directed several music videos for Apple's second album.^[41]

Public speculation about Apple having an eating disorder arose in 1997, upon the release of the music video for "Criminal," in which Apple appeared to be extremely thin. The New Yorker wrote that she "looked like an underfed Calvin Klein model."^[42] During the 1998 Rolling Stone interview, Apple admitted that she "had an eating disorder," and speculated that it stemmed from her rape as an adolescent. "I definitely did have an eating disorder . . . What was really frustrating for me was that everyone thought I was anorexic, and I wasn't. I was just really depressed and self-loathing . . . . For me it wasn't about getting thin, it was about getting rid of the bait attached to my body."

Apple is a vegan. "I'm not really up in the activist world right now [though] . . . I'm not really thinking about it. I'm a vegan, but I don't care if you're eating turkey in front of me. I'm not a preaching vegan."^[43]

Discography[link]

Albums[link]

Extended plays[link]

Singles[link]

Other contributions[link]

• "Across the Universe" (Lennon–McCartney) - Soundtrack to the Motion Picture Pleasantville (1998, Sony), lead vocalist
• "Please Send Me Someone to Love" (Percy Mayfield) - Soundtrack to the Motion Picture Pleasantville (1998, Sony), lead vocalist
• Magnolia (1999, New Line Cinema) - "additional instruments and odd pieces of musical business by jon brion and fiona apple" as stated in the film's credits
• "Bridge over Troubled Water" (Paul Simon) - duet with Johnny Cash from American IV: The Man Comes Around (2002)
• "Father and Son" (Cat Stevens) - duet with Johnny Cash from Unearthed (2003)
• "Frosty the Snowman" - from Christmas Calling (2003)
• "It's Only A Paper Moon" with Maude Maggart - available as a bonus track on some editions of Maggart's 2005 album With Sweet Despair
• "I Want You" (Elvis Costello) - live version from VH1's Live for Decades Rock Live!, released as an iTunes single (2006)
• "Sally's Song" (Catherine O'Hara) - from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas Special Edition Soundtrack (2006)
• "Why Try to Change Me Now" (Cy Coleman) - recorded for the Then Was Then and Now Is Now: A Tribute to Cy Coleman CD/LP / "The Best Is Yet To Come: The Songs Of Cy Coleman" CD/LP
• "Angel Eyes" - a snippet of the song is available at Largo Film
• "Still I" - a duet with Christophe Deluy, hear a snippet of the song available on Christophe Deluy's blog
• "I Walk a Little Faster" (Cy Coleman) - recorded for The Best Is Yet to Come CD/LP
• "Loveless" (David Garza) - track available from Garza's Dream Delay
• "So Sleepy" included on a compilation album released by the organization 826LA, titled Chickens in Love
• "Hey Big Dog" (Margaret Cho) from Cho Dependent (2010)
• "Everyday" (Buddy Holly) with Jon Brion from Rave On Buddy Holly (June 2011)
• "Paper Bag" featured in 2011 film "Bridesmaids"

Music videos[link]

Awards and nominations[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Fiona Apple

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Fiona Apple

• Official website
• Fiona Apple on Myspace
• Fiona Apple on Facebook

Elvis Costello
Costello at the 2009 International Film Festival, Toronto, Canada.
Background information
Birth name	Declan Patrick MacManus
Also known as	D.P. Costello The Imposter Little Hands of Concrete Napoleon Dynamite D.P.A. MacManus Declan Patrick Aloysius MacManus The Right Reverend Jimmy Quickly
Born	(1954-08-25) 25 August 1954 (age 57) Paddington, London, England
Genres	Punk rock Pub rock New Wave
Occupations	Musician, singer-songwriter, record producer
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass, drums
Years active	1970–present
Labels	Stiff, Radar, F-Beat, Demon, Columbia, Warner Bros., Mercury, Island, Deutsche Grammophon, Lost Highway, Verve, HearMusic, Rykodisc, Rhino, Hip-O
Associated acts	The Attractions, The Imposters, Diana Krall, Burt Bacharach, Brodsky Quartet, Nick Lowe, Madness, The Strokes,The Specials,Squeeze,
Website	Elvis Costello.com
Notable instruments
Fender Jazzmaster Fender Telecaster

Elvis Costello (born Declan Patrick MacManus, 25 August 1954) is an English singer-songwriter.^[1] He came to prominence as an early participant in London's pub rock scene in the mid-1970s and later became associated with the punk/New Wave genre.^[2][3] Steeped in word play, the vocabulary of Costello's lyrics is broader than that of most popular songs. His music has drawn on many diverse genres; one critic described him as a "pop encyclopaedia", able to "reinvent the past in his own image".^[4]

Costello has won multiple awards in his career, including a Grammy Award, and has twice been nominated for the Brit Award for Best British Male.^[5] In 2003, Elvis Costello & the Attractions were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.^[6] In 2004, Rolling Stone ranked Costello number 80 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.^[7]

Early life[link]

Costello was born Declan Patrick MacManus^[8] in St Mary's Hospital, London, the son of Lilian Alda (née Ablett, b. 1927, Liverpool)^[9] and Ross MacManus (1927–2011), a musician and bandleader.^[10] He is of Irish heritage.^[11] Costello lived in Twickenham, attending Hounslow Secondary Modern School, which is now St Mark's Catholic Secondary School, in neighbouring Hounslow.^[12][13] With a musically inclined father (who was a jazz trumpeter and sang with The Joe Loss Orchestra),^[14] Costello's first broadcast recording was alongside his dad in a television commercial for R. White's Lemonade (I'm a Secret Lemonade Drinker). His father wrote and sang the song; Costello provided backing vocals. The advertisement won a silver award at the 1974 International Advertising Festival.

Costello moved with his Liverpool-born mother to Birkenhead in 1971. There, he formed his first band, a folk duo called Rusty, with Allan Mayes. After completing secondary school at St. Francis Xavier's College, he moved back to London where he next formed a band called Flip City,^[15] which had a style in the pub rock vein. They were active from 1974 through to early 1976. Around this time, Costello adopted the stage name D.P. Costello. His father had performed under the name Day Costello, and Elvis has said in interviews that he took this name as a tribute to his father.

To support himself, he worked at a number of office jobs, most famously at Elizabeth Arden – immortalised in the lyrics of "I'm Not Angry" as the "vanity factory" – where he worked as a data entry clerk. He worked for a short period as a computer operator at the Midland Bank computer centre in Bootle. He continued to write songs, and began actively looking for a solo recording contract. On the basis of a demo tape, he was signed to independent label Stiff Records. His manager at Stiff, Jake Riviera, suggested a name change, combining Elvis Presley's first name and Costello, his father's stage name.^[16]

Career[link]

1970s[link]

Costello's first single for Stiff was "Less Than Zero", released on 25 March 1977. Two months later, his debut album, My Aim Is True (1977), was released to moderate commercial success (No. 14 in the UK and, later, Top 40 in the US) with Costello appearing on the cover in what became his trademark oversize glasses, bearing some resemblance to Buddy Holly. Stiff's records were initially distributed only in the UK, which meant that Costello's first album and singles were initially available in the US as imports only. In an attempt to change this, Costello was arrested for busking outside a London convention of CBS Records executives, protesting that no US record company had yet seen fit to release his records in the United States.^[17] Costello signed to CBS's Columbia Records label in the US a few months later.

The backing for Costello's debut album was provided by American West Coast band Clover, a country outfit living in England whose members would later go on to join Huey Lewis and the News and The Doobie Brothers. Later in 1977, Costello formed his own permanent backing band, The Attractions, consisting of Steve Nieve (born Steve Nason; piano), Bruce Thomas (bass guitar), and Pete Thomas (drums; unrelated to Bruce Thomas). Growing antipathy between Costello and Bruce Thomas contributed to the Attractions' first split in 1986, and the rift was exacerbated by what Costello felt was his unflattering portrayal in Thomas' 1990 roman à clef The Big Wheel. Despite this, the original group reunited for the 1994 album Brutal Youth and toured together over the next two years, but split for good in 1996, although Nieve and Pete Thomas continued to back Costello through various touring and recording line-ups and as of 2011 are still members of his current backing group The Imposters. The split between Costello and Bruce Thomas appears permanent, however; Bruce made a brief appearance with his former bandmates when the group was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, but when Costello was asked why Bruce did not play with them at the event, he reportedly replied, "I only work with professional musicians."

Costello released his first major hit single, "Watching the Detectives", which was recorded with Nieve and the pair of Steve Goulding (drums) and Andrew Bodnar (bass), both members of Graham Parker's backing band The Rumour (whom he had used to audition for The Attractions).

Elvis Costello, in Massey Hall, Toronto, April 1979

On 17 December 1977, Costello and The Attractions appeared as the musical guest act on the episode of Saturday Night Live as a last minute fill-in for the Sex Pistols. Scheduled to play "Less Than Zero", he surprised the SNL crew by abruptly stopping the song mid-intro, and launching into "Radio Radio." Following a whirlwind tour with other Stiff artists – captured on the Live Stiffs album, notable for Costello's recording of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David standard "I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself" – the band recorded This Year's Model (1978). Some of the more popular tracks include the British hit "(I Don't Want to Go To) Chelsea" and "Pump It Up." His U.S. record company saw Costello as such a priority that his last name replaced the word Columbia on the label of the disc's original pressing. The Attractions' first tour of Australia in December 1978 was notable for controversial performance at Sydney's Regent Theatre when, angered by the group's failure to perform an encore after their brief 35-minute set, audience members destroyed some of the seating.^[18]

A tour of the U.S. and Canada also saw the release of the much-bootlegged Canadian promo-only Live at the El Mocambo, recorded at a Toronto rock club, which finally saw an official release as part of the 2½ Years box set in 1993. It was during the ensuing United States tour that Costello met and developed a relationship with former Playboy model Bebe Buell. Their on-again-off-again courtship would last until 1984 and would allegedly become a deep well of inspiration for Costello's songwriting.

In 1979, he released his third LP Armed Forces (originally to have been titled Emotional Fascism, a phrase that appeared on the LP's inner sleeve). Both the album and the single "Oliver's Army" went to No. 2 in the UK, and the opening track "Accidents Will Happen" gained wide television exposure thanks to its innovative animated music video, directed by Annabel Jankel and Rocky Morton. Costello also found time in 1979 to produce the debut album for the 2 Tone ska revival band The Specials.

Costello's standing in the U.S. was bruised for a time when in March 1979, during a drunken argument with Stephen Stills and Bonnie Bramlett in a Columbus, Ohio Holiday Inn bar, the singer referred to James Brown as a "jive-ass nigger", then upped the ante by pronouncing Ray Charles a "blind, ignorant, nigger".^[19][20] Costello apologised at a New York City press conference a few days later, claiming that he had been drunk and had been attempting to be obnoxious in order to bring the conversation to a swift conclusion, not anticipating that Bramlett would bring his comments to the press. According to Costello, "it became necessary for me to outrage these people with about the most obnoxious and offensive remarks that I could muster." In his liner notes for the expanded version of Get Happy!!, Costello writes that some time after the incident he had declined an offer to meet Charles out of guilt and embarrassment, though Charles himself had forgiven Costello saying "Drunken talk isn't meant to be printed in the paper." Costello worked extensively in Britain's Rock Against Racism campaign both before and after the incident. The incident inspired his Get Happy!! song "Riot Act."^[21]

Costello is also an avid country music fan and has cited George Jones as his favourite country singer. In 1977, he appeared in Jones' duet album My Very Special Guests, contributing "Stranger in the House", which they later performed together on an HBO special dedicated to Jones.

1980s[link]

The soul-infused Get Happy!! would be the first, and—along with King of America–possibly most successful, of Costello's many experiments with genres beyond those he is normally associated with. The single, "I Can't Stand Up for Falling Down" was an old Sam and Dave song (though Costello increased the tempo considerably). Lyrically, the songs are full of Costello's signature word play, to the point that he later felt he had become something of a self-parody and toned it down on later releases; he has mockingly described himself in interviews as "rock and roll's Scrabble champion." His only 1980 appearance in North America was at the Heatwave festival in August near Toronto.

In 1981, the band released Trust amidst growing tensions within the band, particularly between Bruce and Pete Thomas. In the U.S., the single "Watch Your Step" was released and played live on Tom Snyder's Tomorrow show, and received airplay on FM rock radio. In the UK, the single "Clubland" scraped the lower reaches of the charts; follow-up single "From a Whisper to a Scream" (a duet with Glenn Tilbrook of Squeeze) became the first Costello single in over four years to completely miss the charts. Costello also co-produced Squeeze's popular 1981 album East Side Story (with Roger Bechirian) and also performed backing vocals on the group's hit single "Tempted".

Following Trust, Costello released Almost Blue, an album of country music cover songs written by the likes of Hank Williams ("Why Don't You Love Me (Like You Used to Do?)"), Merle Haggard ("Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down") and Gram Parsons ("How Much I Lied"). The album was a tribute to the country music he had grown up listening to, especially George Jones. It received mixed reviews. The first pressings of the record in the UK bore a sticker with the message: "WARNING: This album contains country & western music and may cause a radical reaction in narrow minded listeners." Almost Blue did spawn a surprise UK hit single in a version of George Jones' "Good Year for the Roses" (written by Jerry Chesnut), which reached #6.

Imperial Bedroom (1982) marked a much darker sound, due in part to the production of Geoff Emerick, famed for engineering several Beatles records. Imperial Bedroom remains one of his most critically acclaimed records, but again failed to produce any hit singles. Costello has said he disliked the marketing pitch for the album. The album also featured Costello's song "Almost Blue"; jazz singer and trumpeter Chet Baker would later perform and record a version of this song.

In 1983, he released Punch the Clock, featuring female backing vocal duo (Afrodiziak) and a four-piece horn section (The TKO Horns), alongside The Attractions. Clive Langer (who co-produced with Alan Winstanley), provided Costello with a melody which eventually became "Shipbuilding", which featured a trumpet solo by Chet Baker. Prior to the release of Costello's own version, a version of the song was a minor UK hit for former Soft Machine drummer Robert Wyatt.

Under the pseudonym The Imposter, Costello released "Pills and Soap", an attack on the changes in British society brought on by Thatcherism, released to coincide with the run-up to the 1983 UK general election. Punch the Clock also generated an international hit in the single "Everyday I Write the Book", aided by a music video featuring lookalikes of the Prince and Princess of Wales undergoing domestic strife in a suburban home. The song became Costello's first Top 40 hit single in the U.S. Also in the same year, Costello provided vocals on a version of the Madness song "Tomorrow's Just Another Day" released as a B-side on the single of the same name.

Tensions within the band—notably between Costello and bassist Bruce Thomas—were beginning to tell, and Costello announced his retirement and the break-up of the group shortly before they were to record Goodbye Cruel World (1984). Costello would later say of this record that they had "got it as wrong as you can in terms of the execution". The record was poorly received upon its initial release; the liner notes to the 1995 Rykodisc re-release, penned by Costello, begin with the words "Congratulations!, you've just purchased our worst album". Costello's retirement, although short-lived, was accompanied by two compilations, Elvis Costello: The Man in the UK, Europe and Australia, and The Best of Elvis Costello & The Attractions in the U.S.

In 1985, he appeared in the Live Aid benefit concert in England, singing the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love" as a solo artist. (The event was overrunning and Costello was asked to "ditch the band".) Costello introduced the song as an "old northern English folk song", and the audience was invited to sing the chorus. In the same year Costello teamed up with friend T-Bone Burnett for the single "The People's Limousine" under the moniker of The Coward Brothers. That year, Costello also produced Rum Sodomy & the Lash for the Irish punk/folk band The Pogues.

By 1986, Costello was preparing to make a comeback. Working in the U.S. with Burnett, a band containing a number of Elvis Presley's sidemen (including James Burton and Jerry Scheff), and minor input from the Attractions, he produced King of America, an acoustic guitar-driven album with a country sound. It was billed as by "The Costello Show featuring the Attractions and Confederates" in the UK and Europe and "The Costello Show featuring Elvis Costello" in North America. Around this time he legally changed his name back to Declan MacManus, adding Aloysius as an extra middle name. Costello retooled his upcoming tour to allow for multiple nights in each city, playing one night with The Confederates (James Burton et al.), one night with The Attractions, and one night solo acoustic. In May 1986, Costello performed at Self Aid, a benefit concert held in Dublin that focused on the chronic unemployment which was widespread in Ireland at that time.

Later that year, Costello returned to the studio with the Attractions and recorded Blood and Chocolate, which was lauded for a post-punk fervour not heard since 1978's This Year's Model. It also marked the return of producer Nick Lowe, who had produced Costello's first five albums. While Blood and Chocolate failed to chart a hit single of any significance, it did produce what has since become one of Costello's signature concert songs, "I Want You." On this album, Costello adopted the alias Napoleon Dynamite, the name he later attributed to the character of the emcee that he played during the vaudeville-style tour to support Blood and Chocolate. (The pseudonym had previously been used in 1982, when the B-side single "Imperial Bedroom" was credited to Napoleon Dynamite & The Royal Guard, and was later appropriated by the 2004 film Napoleon Dynamite). In 1989, Costello, with a new contract with Warner Bros., released Spike, which spawned his biggest single in America, the Top 20 hit "Veronica", one of several songs Costello co-wrote with Paul McCartney in that period (see Collaborations).

1990s[link]

In 1991, having grown a long beard, Costello released Mighty Like a Rose, which featured the single "The Other Side of Summer." He also found time to co-compose and co-produce, with Richard Harvey, the title and incidental music for the mini-series G.B.H. by Alan Bleasdale. This entirely instrumental, and largely orchestral, soundtrack garnered a BAFTA, for Best Music for a TV Series for the pair.

In 1993, Costello experimented with classical music with a critically acclaimed collaboration with the Brodsky Quartet^[22][23] on The Juliet Letters. During this period, Costello wrote a full album's worth of material for Wendy James, and these songs became the tracks on her 1993 solo album Now Ain't the Time for Your Tears. Costello returned to rock and roll the following year with a project that reunited him with The Attractions, Brutal Youth. In 1995, Costello released Kojak Variety, an album of cover songs recorded five years earlier, and followed in 1996 with an album of songs originally written for other artists, All This Useless Beauty. This was the final album of original material that he issued under his Warner Bros. contract. In the spring of 1996, Costello played a series of intimate club dates, backed only by Nieve on the piano, in support of All This Useless Beauty. An ensuing summer and fall tour with the Attractions proved to be the death knell for the band. With relations between Costello and bassist Bruce Thomas at a breaking point, Costello announced that the current tour would be the Attractions' last. The quartet performed their final U.S. show in Seattle, Washington on 1 September 1996, before wrapping up their tour in Japan. To fulfill his contractual obligations to Warner Bros., Costello released a greatest hits album titled Extreme Honey (1997). It contained an original track titled "The Bridge I Burned", featuring Costello's son, Matt, on bass. In the intervening period, Costello had served as artistic chair for the 1995 Meltdown Festival, which gave him the opportunity to explore his increasingly eclectic musical interests. His involvement in the festival yielded a one-off live EP with jazz guitarist Bill Frisell, which featured both cover material and a few of his own songs.

In 1998, Costello signed a multi-label contract with Polygram Records, sold by its parent company the same year to become part of the Universal Music Group. Costello released his new work on what he deemed the suitable imprimatur within the family of labels. His first new release as part of this contract involved a collaboration with Burt Bacharach. Their work had commenced earlier, in 1996, on a song called "God Give Me Strength" for the movie Grace of My Heart. This led the pair to write and record the critically acclaimed album Painted From Memory, released under his new contract in 1998, on the Mercury Records label, featuring songs that were largely inspired by the dissolution of his marriage to Cait O'Riordan. Costello and Bacharach performed several concerts with a full orchestral backing, and also recorded an updated version of Bacharach's "I'll Never Fall in Love Again" for the soundtrack to Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, with both appearing in the film to perform the song. He also wrote "I Throw My Toys Around" for The Rugrats Movie and performed it with No Doubt. The same year, he collaborated with Paddy Moloney of The Chieftains on "The Long Journey Home" on the soundtrack of the PBS/Disney mini-series of the same name. The soundtrack won a Grammy that year.

In 1999, Costello contributed a version of "She", released in 1974 by Charles Aznavour and Herbert Kretzmer, for the soundtrack of the film Notting Hill, with Trevor Jones producing. For the 25th anniversary of Saturday Night Live, Costello was invited to the program, where he re-enacted his abrupt song-switch: This time, however, he interrupted the Beastie Boys' "Sabotage", and they acted as his backing group for "Radio Radio".

2000 to present[link]

Costello performing at Glastonbury, 2005

In 2000, Costello appeared at the Town Hall Theatre, New York, in Steve Nieve's opera Welcome to the Voice, alongside Ron Sexsmith and John Flansburgh of They Might Be Giants. In 2001, Costello was artist-in-residence at UCLA and wrote the music for a new ballet. He produced and appeared on an album of pop songs for the classical singer Anne Sofie von Otter. He released the album When I Was Cruel in 2002 on Island Records, and toured with a new band, the Imposters (essentially the Attractions but with a different bass player, Davey Faragher, formerly of Cracker). He appeared as himself in the "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" episode of The Simpsons. On 23 February 2003, Costello, along with Bruce Springsteen, Steve Van Zandt, and Dave Grohl, performed a version of The Clash's "London Calling" at the 45th Grammy Awards ceremony, in honour of Clash frontman Joe Strummer, who had died the previous December. In March, Elvis Costello & the Attractions were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He announced his engagement in May to Canadian jazz singer and pianist Diana Krall, whom he had seen in concert and then met backstage at the Sydney Opera House in Australia. That September, he released North, an album of piano-based ballads concerning the breakdown of his former marriage, and his falling in love with Krall. Also that year, Costello made an appearance in the television series Frasier as a folk singer in the Cafe Nervosa, sending Frasier and Niles on a search for a new coffee bar.^[24][25]

The song "Scarlet Tide" (co-written by Costello and T-Bone Burnett and used in the film Cold Mountain) was nominated for a 2004 Academy Award; he performed it at the awards ceremony with Alison Krauss, who sang the song on the official soundtrack. Costello co-wrote many songs on Krall's 2004 CD, The Girl in the Other Room, the first of hers to feature several original compositions. In July 2004, Costello's first full-scale orchestral work, Il Sogno, was performed in New York. The work, a ballet after Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, was commissioned by Italian dance troupe Aterballeto, and received critical acclaim from the classical music critics. Performed by the London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Michael Tilson Thomas, the recording was released on CD in September by Deutsche Grammophon. Costello released the album The Delivery Man, recorded in Oxford, Mississippi, and released on Lost Highway Records, in September of the same year, and it was hailed as one of his best albums.

Costello's hand prints on the European Walk of Fame, Rotterdam.

A CD recording of a collaboration with Marian McPartland on her show Piano Jazz was released in 2005. It featured Costello singing six jazz standards and two of his own songs, accompanied by McPartland on piano. In November, Costello started recording a new album with Allen Toussaint and producer Joe Henry. The River in Reverse was released in the UK on the Verve label the following year in May.

A 2005 tour included a gig at Glastonbury that Costello considered to be so dreadful that he said "I don't care if I ever play England again. That gig made up my mind I wouldn't come back. I don't get along with it. We lost touch. It's 25 years since I lived there. I don't dig it, they don't dig me....British music fans don't have the same attitude to age as they do in America, where young people come to check out, say Willie Nelson. They feel some connection with him and find a role for that music in their lives."^[26]

In a studio recording of Nieve's opera Welcome to the Voice (2006, Deutsche Grammophon), Costello interpreted the character of Chief of Police, with Barbara Bonney, Robert Wyatt, Sting and Amanda Roocroft, and the album reached No. 2 in the Billboard classical charts. Costello later reprised the piece on the stage of the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris in 2008, with Sting, Joe Sumner of Fiction Plane (Sting's son) and Sylvia Schwartz. Also released in 2006 was a live recording of a concert with the Metropole Orkest at the North Sea Jazz Festival, entitled My Flame Burns Blue. The soundtrack for House M.D. featured Costello's interpretation of "Beautiful" by Christina Aguilera, with the song appearing in the second episode of Series 2.

Costello was commissioned to write a chamber opera by the Danish Royal Opera, Copenhagen, on the subject of Hans Christian Andersen's infatuation with Swedish soprano Jenny Lind. Called The Secret Songs it was unfinished.^[27] In a performance in 2007 directed by Kasper Bech Holten at the Opera's studio theatre (Takelloftet), finished songs were interspersed with pieces from Costello's 1993 collaborative classical album The Juliet Letters, featuring Danish soprano Sine Bundgaard as Lind. The 2009 album Secret, Profane & Sugarcane includes material from Secret Songs.

On 22 April 2008, Momofuku was released on Lost Highway Records, the same imprint that released The Delivery Man, his previous studio album. The album was, at least initially, released exclusively on vinyl (with a code to download a digital copy). That summer, in support of the album, Costello toured with The Police on the final leg of their 2007/2008 Reunion Tour. Costello played a homecoming gig at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall on 25 June 2006.^[28] and, that month, gave his first performance in Poland, appearing with The Imposters for the closing gig of the Malta theatre festival in Poznań.

In July 2008, Costello (as Declan McManus) was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Music from the University of Liverpool.

From late 2008 into 2010, Costello hosted Channel 4/CTV's series Spectacle in which Costello talked and performed with stars in various fields, styled similarly to Inside the Actors Studio. Between its two seasons, the show compiled 20 episodes, including one where Costello was interviewed by actress Mary-Louise Parker.^[29]

Costello was featured on Fall Out Boy's 2008 album Folie à Deux, providing vocals on the track "What a Catch, Donnie", along with other artists who are friends with the band.

Costello appeared in Stephen Colbert's television special A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All. In the program, he was eaten by a bear, but later saved by Santa Claus; he also sang a duet with Colbert. The special was first aired on 23 November 2008.^[30] Costello released Secret, Profane & Sugarcane, a collaboration with T-Bone Burnett, on 9 June 2009. Burnett previously worked with Costello on King of America and Spike.^[31] It was his first on the Starbucks Hear Music label and a return to country music in the manner of Good Year for the Roses.

Costello performing in tribute to music legends Chuck Berry and Leonard Cohen who were the recipients of the first annual PEN Awards for songwriting excellence, at the JFK Presidential Library, in Boston, Massachusetts on 26 February 2012.

Costello appeared as himself in the finale of the third season of 30 Rock and sang in the episode's celebrity telethon, Kidney Now!.^[32] The episode references Costello's given name when Jack Donaghy accuses him of concealing his true identity: "Declan McManus, international art thief."

In May 2009, Costello made a surprise cameo appearance on-stage at the Beacon Theater in New York as part of Spinal Tap's Unwigged and Unplugged show, singing their fictional 1965 hit "Gimme Some Money" with the band backing him up.

On 15 May 2010, Costello announced he would withdraw from a concert performed in Israel in opposition to Israel's treatment of Palestinians. In a statement on his website, Costello wrote, "It has been necessary to dial out the falsehoods of propaganda, the double game and hysterical language of politics, the vanity and self-righteousness of public communiqués from cranks in order to eventually sift through my own conflicted thoughts."^[33]

Also in 2010, Elvis Costello appeared as himself in David Simon's television series, Treme.^[34] Costello released the album National Ransom in autumn of 2010.

In 2011, Elvis Costello appeared as himself once again, this time on Sesame Street to perform a song with Elmo and Cookie Monster, titled "Monster Went and Ate My Red 2", a play on (The Angels Wanna Wear My) Red Shoes. The same year, Costello performed "Taken for a Fool", live from Madison Square Garden with The Strokes.

On 26 February 2012, Costello paid tribute to music legends Chuck Berry and Leonard Cohen who were the recipients of the first annual PEN Awards for songwriting excellence, at the JFK Presidential Library, in Boston, Massachusetts on 26 February 2012.^[35]

Personal life[link]

Costello has been married three times, the first time to Mary Burgoyne in 1974, with whom he had a son.^[26]

In 1985, Costello became involved with Cait O'Riordan, former bassist for the English/Irish group The Pogues, while he was producing The Pogues' album Rum Sodomy and the Lash.^{[citation needed]} They married in 1986 and split up by the end of 2002.^[26]

Costello became engaged to pianist Diana Krall in May 2003,^[26] and married her at the home of Elton John on 6 December that year.^[36] Krall gave birth to twin sons, Dexter Henry Lorcan and Frank Harlan James, on 6 December 2006 in New York City.^[37]

A vegetarian since the early 1980s, Costello says he was moved to reject meat after seeing the documentary The Animals Film (1982), which also helped inspire his song "Pills and Soap" (from Punch the Clock, 1983).^[14]

Humanitarian causes[link]

Costello sits on the Advisory Board of the Board of Directors of the Jazz Foundation of America.^[38][39] Costello began working with the Jazz Foundation in 2001, and has been a featured performer in their annual benefit A Great Night in Harlem^[40] since 2006. Costello has donated his time working with the Jazz Foundation of America^[41] to save the homes and the lives of America's elderly jazz and blues musicians, including musicians who survived Hurricane Katrina.

Collaborations[link]

In addition to his major recorded collaborations with Bacharach, the Brodsky Quartet, and von Otter, Costello has frequently been involved in other collaborations.

In 1987, Costello began a long-running songwriting collaboration with Paul McCartney. They wrote a number of songs together, including:

• "Back On My Feet", the B-side of McCartney's 1987 single "Once Upon a Long Ago", later added as a bonus track on the 1993 re-issue of McCartney's Flowers in the Dirt
• Costello's "Veronica" and "Pads, Paws and Claws" from Spike (1989) (Also, McCartney plays Hofner bass but does not have a writing credit for "This Town" – the opening song for the album.)
• "So Like Candy" and "Playboy to a Man" from Mighty Like a Rose (1991)
• McCartney's "My Brave Face", "Don't Be Careless Love", "That Day Is Done" and "You Want Her Too" from Flowers in the Dirt (1989)
• "The Lovers That Never Were" and "Mistress and Maid" from Off the Ground (1993).
• "Shallow Grave" from All This Useless Beauty (1996).

Costello talked about their collaboration:

When we sat down together he wouldn't have any sloppy bits in there. That was interesting. The ironic part is, if it sounds like he wrote it, I probably did and vice versa. He wanted to do all the ones with lots of words and all on one note, and I'm the one trying to work in the "Please Please Me" harmony all over the place.^{[citation needed]}

• In 1987, he appeared on the HBO special Roy Orbison and Friends, A Black and White Night, which featured his long-time idol Roy Orbison, and was invited back to Saturday Night Live for the first time since 1977.

• In 1988, Costello co-wrote "At the Other End (of the Telescope)" with Aimee Mann; this song appears on the Til Tuesday album Everything's Different Now.

• In 2000, Costello wrote lyrics to "Green Song", a solo cello piece by Svante Henryson; this song appears on the Anne Sofie von Otter album For the Stars.

• In 2005, Costello performed with Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong. They played both Costello and Green Day songs together, including "Alison", "No Action", "Basket Case" and "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)".

• In 2007, Costello collaborated with the Argentinean/Uruguay an electro-tango band Bajofondo on the song "Fairly Right" from the album Mar Dulce.

• In 2008, Costello collaborated with Fall Out Boy on the track "What a Catch, Donnie" from their album Folie a Deux.

• In Jenny Lewis' 2008 release, Acid Tongue, Costello provided vocals for the song "Carpetbaggers".

• In November 2009, Costello appeared live with Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band at Madison Square Garden and performed the Jackie Wilson song, Higher and Higher.^[42]

• In December 2009, it was announced that Costello would be portraying The Shape in the upcoming album Ghost Brothers of Darkland County, a collaboration between rock singer John Mellencamp and novelist Stephen King.^[43]

• In February 2010, Costello appeared in the live cinecast of Garrison Keillor's Prairie Home Companion, singing some of his own songs, and participating in many of the show's other musical and acting performances.

• In April 2011, played the song "Taken For a Fool" with The Strokes in Madison Square Garden.

• On 30 April 2011, played the song "Pump it Up" with The Odds before the start of a Vancouver Canucks playoff game at Rogers Arena in Vancouver BC.^[44]

Artistic significance[link]

Costello has worked with Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, Lucinda Williams, Kid Rock, Lee Konitz, Brian Eno, and Rubén Blades.

Costello is also a music fan, and often champions the works of others in print. He has written several pieces for the magazine Vanity Fair, including the summary of what a perfect weekend of music would be. He has contributed to two Grateful Dead tribute albums and covered Jerry Garcia/Robert Hunter tunes such as "Ship of Fools", "Friend of the Devil", "It Must Have Been the Roses", "Ripple" and "Tennessee Jed" in concert. His collaboration with Bacharach honoured Bacharach's place in pop music history. Costello also appeared in documentaries about singers Dusty Springfield, Brian Wilson, Wanda Jackson, Ron Sexsmith and Memphis, Tennessee-based Stax Records. He has also interviewed one of his own influences, Joni Mitchell. He was instrumental in bringing Sexsmith to a wider audience in 1995 by championing his debut album in Mojo magazine, even appearing on the cover with the album.^[45]

In 2004, Rolling Stone Magazine ranked him No. 80 on their list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.^[46][47]

Discography[link]

Costello has released over 30 studio albums on his own and with the Attractions, the Imposters, or others. He has also released five live albums: Live at the El Mocambo, Deep Dead Blue, Costello & Nieve, My Flame Burns Blue, Live at Hollywood High, and The Return Of The Spectacular Spinning Songbook. There have also been numerous compilations, box sets, and reissues by labels such as Rykodisc, Demon, Rhino, and Universal Music Enterprises.

Filmography[link]

Actor[link]

• 1979 film debut as "The Earl of Manchester" in Americathon
• 1984 as "Henry Scully" in the UK TV series, Scully
• 1984 as "Stone Deaf A&R Man" in "The Bullshitters", a Comic Strip film first aired on Channel 4.
• 1985 as inept magician "Rosco de Ville" in the Alan Bleasdale film, No Surrender
• 1987 as "Hives the Butler" in the Alex Cox film, Straight to Hell, starring Joe Strummer and Courtney Love
• 1994 as himself on The Larry Sanders Show in the episode "People's Choice"
• 1997 as a barman in Spice World.
• 1999 as himself performing "I'll Never Fall In Love Again" with Burt Bacharach in Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me
• 1999 as a younger version of himself in 200 Cigarettes
• 2001 as himself performing "Fly Me to the Moon" on the series finale of 3rd Rock from the Sun
• 2002 as himself on the episode "How I Spent My Strummer Vacation" of The Simpsons
• 2003 as Ben on Frasier, one episode
• 2004 as himself in the UK TV Dead Ringers New Year Special, apparently and reportedly having serendipitously entered a filming venue^[48]
• 2004 as himself in Two and a Half Men – Season 2, Episode 1^[49]
• 2006 as himself in Delirious
• 2006 as himself in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
• 2008 as himself in "A Colbert Christmas: The Greatest Gift of All!"
• 2009 as himself on the episode of 30 Rock, "Kidney Now!"^[50]
• 2010 as himself on Treme

Soundtrack[link]

• 2003 Academy Award nomination for best original song, "The Scarlet Tide", in Cold Mountain

Bibliography[link]

• Costello, Elvis. A Singing Dictionary. London: Plangent Visions Music; New York, N.Y.: Exclusive selling agent for the United States and Canada, Warner Bros. Publications, 1980. ISBN 0-7692-1505-X. Sheet music, chords, and lyrics for works 1977–1980.

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Paumgarten, Nick (8 November 2010). "Profiles: Brilliant Mistakes". The New Yorker 86 (35): 48–59. 

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Elvis Costello

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Elvis Costello

• ElvisCostello.com
• Official Elvis Costello Lost Highway Records Artist Page
• Elvis Costello at the Internet Movie Database
• Elvis Costello at Allmusic. Retrieved 5 December 2010.
• The Elvis Costello Home Page Wiki