Elvis Presley

Elvis Aron Presley was born in
Tupelo, Mississippi on January 8, 
1932.  He first worked as an usher at
a local movie theater, then became a
truck driver at the age of 19. In 1954,
Elvis recorded a song in a small
sound studio owned by Sun Records,
as a birthday surprise for his mother
Gladys. Sam Phillips, owner of Sun
Records, happened to hear the single
and offered him a contract. It was
Phillips who steered Presley towards
a form of rock that blended black
rhythm & blues with white country &
western. The result was the first
Presley record “That's all Right”,
written by Arthur Crudup, and his
fame began to grow.
     His manager, Tom Parker, led him
to his next breakthrough, the 1956 hit
“Heartbreak Hotel”.   By the time he
appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show at
the end of 1956, he had scored three
more hits and was rapidly becoming
an international phenomenon. His
first motion picture, “Love Me
Tender” was followed by 33 other
feature films.
     With his trademark swiveling hips
and gyrations, Presley brought a
sexual charge to his performances
that shocked critics and delighted his
teenage audiences. Long before
Beatlemania, a concert in Florida
once erupted in an all-out fan riot.
     In 1958 he was drafted into the
Army and was posted to a unit in Bad
Nauheim, Germany. Here he was
introduced to Priscilla Beaulieu,
whom he ultimately married in 1967.
In 1960 he returned to the U.S. to
renew his career. Even though his
commercial success continued
unabated (he would produce 83 hits
over the span of 16 years), the
innovative spirit and freshness of his
music was gone.
     In 1961 he stopped performing live
(until 1968), concentrating on re-
cordings and his movies instead. He
started to live on junk food, sleeping
pills and stimulants. In 1968, and
again in 1973 and 1974, he appeared
on stage as an increasingly over-
weight man in a white matador
outfit. Nonetheless, the 1973 concert
in Hawaii was one of the largest pop
events in history, watched by 1 billion
fans worldwide.  One week before
the start of a new U.S. Tour, on
August 16, 1977, Elvis Presley died at
the age of 42. The official cause of
death was heart failure.
     Presley, affectionately known by
his fans as "The King", was one of
the most successful recording artists
of all time. He sold over 600 million
records with total gross revenues in
excess of 7 billion dollars. His
Memphis mansion, Graceland, con-
tinues to attract fans from around
the world as a shrine to the Presley
legend.