HAPPY BIRTHDAY ELVIS!

A bit of controversy over if this is actually Elvis or an impersonator singing.    Here is the definitive answer, posted on YouTube. 

 

"This was officially released on the Memphis Recording Service release Off Duty with Private Presley in 2010.  This recording was from May 1958.  On the same day, he sang Sail Along Silvery Moon/I Understand Just How I Feel, Happy, Happy Birthday Baby; Dialogue, I Can't Help It, Dialogue, Who's Sorry Now, Who's Sorry Now reprise, another five goes at Happy, Happy Birthday Baby, Dialogue, Tumblin' Tumbleweeds/Blue Moon/Don't You Know I Love You, Tomorrow Night (twice), Little Darlin' Monologue, and Just A Closer Walk With Thee.  Who's Sorry Now was done by Anita Wood with Elvis singing backup." 

ELVIS PRESLEY ANITA WOOD and FRIENDS : 1958

HAPPY HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY...

(48) WAITING and WONDERING WHAT'S NEXT

So, I waited for Elvis' return.

DJ - friends George Klein and Dewey Phillips waited.

His friends in Memphis and around the world waited.

His fans waited.

What would Elvis really be like after a stint in the U.S. Army? Would he still be Elvis the Pelvis? His career remained hot, thanks to his manager Colonel Parker, but would he remain true to himself?

We were not the only ones who waited and wondered.

There were a few people left behind who needed answers.

Anita Wood, the girlfriend who had been faithful, was one of them.

The once upon a time Blue Moon Boys, Scotty Moore, "The Guitar that Changed the World," Bill Black, who played stand up base, and D.J. Fontana, his drummer, wondered too. Bill, and Scotty had been the Blue Moon Boys and toured with Elvis and originally they were called the HILLBILLY CAT and THE BLUE MOON BOYS! (Fontana had been added a bit later than 1954 and featured in television performances by 1956.)

Before Elvis left, Colonel Tom Parker had taken on Elvis - and only Elvis - as his star. Colonel was his agent, manager, his everything. He did not take on the Blue Moon Boys, and they were left wondering if they had any employment with the famous Elvis or not. Would they play with him live on tour, on television, or in the studio? Hourly wages? Salary? What about a percentage of the royalties?

Heartbreak Hotel - 1956 - Elvis Presley with the Blue Moon Boys backing him. This You-Tube video presentation has Scotty Moore stepping forward to do a bit of a solo.

VIDEO REMOVED APRIL 2012

There are a few books out including one on Scotty Moore that we've read, and a newer one about the Blue Moon Boys and Elvis that we haven't.We've decided not to give any thumbs up or thumbs down on books. We understand that there are numerous perspectives when it comes to Elvis Presley, and the people who surrounded him, and we will allow that each has the right to his own experience and the telling of it.

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The next blog will focus on one of the Blue Moon Boys, Scotty Moore.

As a music producer I, and many others like me, have told a studio guitarist

"Sound like Scotty Moore."

(47) ELVIS, ANITA WOOD and DEBRA PAGET

If you think you're on a cliff-hanger here with my story about meeting Elvis at the train, you're right. There's just so much of a story to tell. And already I'm a bit off on a tangent.

These You-Tube videos are addictive. This one is just so good, we've got to give a hand to the contributor, and well, you can see what I mean when I say that Elvis Presley was the best advertisement the U.S. Army ever had! You can see a few pictures here of Elvis singing autographs for fans, which he did on an almost daily basis, outside his house. "Soldier Boy" was released after he returned home, by the way, but it's fitting for this fine video.

No, Elvis may have been lonely for the United States of America, but he was never without women, not since he became Elvis the Pelvis, the millionaire, and a star.

Now, before Elvis left for the army, it was understood that Anita Wood, a talented singer in her own right, who put out records and was a DJ who had her own radio program as well, was his girl. Early on it was an understanding between Elvis and the men who surrounded him, friends as well as employees, that no one would go after one of his girlfriends - if she really was. So everyone was hands off Anita. (Anita put out a song called, "I'll Wait Forever," which was assumed to be a song she was singing to Elvis, because it was about her real life dilemma.)

Here's a web site dedicated to Anita Wood Brewer that has a number of photos of Elvis and Anita enjoying each others company and of her seeing him off to the army. The second link below is right to a photo that shows Vernon and Gladys Presley as well, overwrought that their son in leaving... The beautiful blonde with her arm through Glady's is Anita.

These days there are a couple books out by women who have elaborated their affairs with Elvis in the late 1950's, and many women are mentioned connected to him in many other books. There was one woman that Elvis was very attracted to that he did not get involved with - because she might have been flirtatious but she belonged to someone else. That was Debra Paget, his co-star in 1956 in "Love Me Tender." In this Milton Berle show clip, presented by a You-Tube contributor, a comedy skit is made of Elvis' interest in Debra - her type.

For years Elvis liked the Debra Paget type.

DEBRA PAGET AND ELVIS ON MILTON BERLE

(26) CLIFF GLEAVES, ANITA WOOD, and SUN RECORDS

That night that Elvis and his guys burst into the Wink Martindale's dance party show, Elvis drove us to Graceland in his new stretch limo. Riding next to Elvis as he drove was his girlfriend Anita Wood. Gladys Presley, Elvis' mother, thought Anita was the perfect girlfriend for him. She ran her own radio show, (Anita Wood was one of the early women in radio broadcasting), and she had recorded songs herself. Perhaps more than all that, Anita Wood was all for Elvis' success. She was familiar with the music business and touring, and she knew the lifestyle he lead. Anita Wood, as a recording artist, was known as one of the "Memphis Belles."

Cliff Gleaves, a once hotter than hot hep cat disc jockey, who had given it up to travel with Elvis - by Elvis' invitation, kept clicking his fingers. He kept saying "We have James Dean in the car with us!" The guys put me through the James Dean poses and I was glad to oblige.

Cliff Gleaves and Anita Wood had something in common with Elvis in that they had both recorded on Sun, the small label that Sam Phillips had in Memphis, where local talent paid for vanity recordings and small budget records were recorded. Most of these recordings were not hits in terms of the way we think of hits now, but small labels did provide local and regional music, and the special flavor of music emerging in Memphis, with local musicians and local talent, is preserved in Sun recordings. Anita recorded a song called "I'll Wait Forever," at Sun and as things turned out, she didn't exactly wait for Elvis, but she did date him for years.

ROCKIN COUNTRY STYLE DISCOGRAPHY - CLIFF CLEAVES link -click title!


Anita Wood's songs are included on Sun Recordscompilation disks.

http://koti.mbnet.fi/wdd/sun.htm

New Link! SUN RECORDS DISCOGRAPHY includes Anita

NEW YOUTUBE VIDEO of her hit "I'll Wait Forever"

UPDATE April 2012 A New Music Video!