Grammy Award Songs

Elvis, the King of Rock 'n' Roll, won only 3 Grammy Awards for his music. All for Gospel. How can that be? 

The Grammys were founded in 1958. Elvis' heyday was from 1956-1957. Easy to see how he missed out on some possible major Rock 'n Roll Grammys. In total Elvis received 16 Grammy Nominations of which 6 were for Singles. 

If we dive into his Single Nominations, we found that he received two nominations each in the 50s, 60s and 70s, covering the R&B, Pop, Gospel and C&W genres. Once again, no Rock 'n Roll nominations in sight.

GRAMMY NOMINATED SINGLES

Elvis received the following Grammy Nominations for his Singles:

50s 

• A Fool Such As I: Record Of The Year
• A Big Hunk O' Love: Best R&B Performance / Best Top 40 Artist Performance.

60s 

• Are You Lonesome Tonight: Best Pop Single Performance / Best Male Vocal  Performance / Record Of The Year 
• You'll Never Walk Alone: Best Sacred Performance.

70s

• How Great Thou Art (Live, 1974): Best Inspirational Performance - WIN. 
• Softly, As I Leave You (Live, Posthumous): Best Male C&W Performance.

Elvis Live On CD (1971)

Via FTD we previously had two live 1971 Elvis concerts:

1. Dinner Show, 28-10-71, Las Vegas, NV, (The Impossible Dream) 
2. Evening Show, 28-11-71, Boston, MA, (Elvis As Recorded at Boston Garden)

As part of its ongoing live on tour series, FTD Records has released Elvis: Live In Vegas '71 as a 3-CD 5" digipak, featuring three 1971 shows recorded in Vegas, respectively on Jan 27-29.

FTD refer to this release as "having imperfections", but "the historic importance and rarity of these recordings were prioritized". Translated, it means "some of the sound quality might be poor."

To buy or not to buy...

CONS:

1. Some sound quality might ruin the listening experience.

PROS:

1. Directly from the original master tapes

2. Rare live songs are included

3. Elvis give the songs respectful treatments 

THE FINAL VERDICT might be a toss up between quality and rarity.

EVEN if these shows are of more historical importance than anything else, finally we have at least 5 concerts from 1971, making it no longer a "missing year!"

Thanks To Bill Porter

In November 2022 The Elvis Collector's label, FTD Records, released Elvis: Live In Vegas '71. Turns out the initial recording engineer was Bill Porter. 

CROSSING PATHS WITH ELVIS

After the '68 NBC-TV Special, Elvis recorded some songs at the beginning of 1969 to get into the charts again and cemented his comeback. There was a mixing problem on Suspicious Minds, around the unusual fade out. Elvis' record producer Felton Jarvis asked sound engineer Bill Porter to help. Bill helped and left.

A few months later Elvis returned to live performances in Vegas. Afterwards he called Porter and asked him to help fix the sound in the main showroom as he could not hear himself and a new Vegas run was scheduled for the beginning of the next year. 

When Elvis started rehearsals in January 1970 Porter attended and fixed the sound by replacing the stage monitors (that the hotel's engineers could not get working) with his own sound equipment and laying the column speakers on their sides on the lip of the stage, propping them up to aim at Elvis, who was very happy with the result.

FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER ELVIS COULD HEAR HIMSELF ON STAGE.

Elvis insisted that Porter mixed the sound of these January 1970 shows (even though Bill had no previous experience recording live sound). He quickly learned about acoustic feedback during the first song but backstage after the show film stars and musical artists kept complimenting Elvis that Porter's sound was "just like the album."

From then on Bill Porter mixed all of Elvis' live concerts.  

Jailhouse Rock

Last Saturday afternoon we got together to watch, listen and talk Elvis! We had great fun. The film Jailhouse Rock was spotlighted in our film series The Elvis Award Nominated Films. 

Did you know Jailhouse Rock has received an 

1. ASCAP for Most Performed Feature Film Standard for the title song (1991)
2. induction into the NATIONAL FILM ARCHIVES REGISTRY as a film of Cultural/Historical/Aesthetic significance (2004)

The Jordanaires

The book The Jordanaires: The Story of the World's Greatest Backup Vocal Group (as told by Gordon Stoker) is currently available online at Loot.

SYNOPSIS (PART)

The greatest backup group in the history of recorded music undoubtedly was The Jordanaires, a gospel group of mostly Tennessee boys, formed in the 1940s, that set the standard for studio vocal groups in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and beyond. In their 65-year career, from 1948 through 2013, the recordings they sang on have sold an estimated 8 billion copies.

They sang on about 260 Elvis recordings, including most of his biggest hits. They were in 3 of his best-known movies, appeared with him on most of his early nation-wide TV shows, and toured with him. Throughout Elvis' early career, they were his most trusted friends.

HOW DID THE JORDANAIRES COME TO SING BACKUP FOR ELVIS?

Well, one hot August night in 1955 The Jordanaires were in the Ellis Auditorium in Memphis appearing on a bill with Eddy Arnold. That night they were approached backstage by Elvis Presley, then a struggling singer, who had had some success and was hoping to make it big.

GORDON STOKER REMEMBERS:

I guess the first thing I remember about him was his shirt. Men just didn't wear pink shirts in those days. He also was a little dirty around the neck. He was polite and had a warm smile. So, when he approached me, I took the time to hear what he had to say.

What he said was, "I'm a big fan of y'all's. I'm a singer myself. I'm on the Sun label right now. That's a local Memphis label. I'm trying to get a deal with a major label. If I do, I'd like you guys, the Jordanaires, to sing with me on my records." 

The rest is history.