American Country Singers

"Very proud that my father will receive the Medal of Freedom. That he’s getting it with Elvis is icing on the cake."

"i) I didn’t like Elvis before I went to work with him in the summer of 1969. I mean, I didn’t know him. I just didn’t like his music. I was into black music mostly and jazz so when I went to work for him on the first rehearsal I told my ex-wife, I don’t think I’m going to do this gig, but I’m going to go down and check it out, see what’s going on.’ I came home that night and said, you gotta come down and hear this guy tomorrow night.’ She said, you’re kidding.’I said, no, you got to come down and hear him.’ She came down the next night to the rehearsal and she walked away a fan. It was that immediate. When I walked in and I heard him I said, Oh, oh, I believe that I've been missing something. ii) In some ways Elvis was Conservative and in other ways he was very Liberal. He wasn't someone that was following some political line, you know he'd figure out for himself what he thought was right"

"He is the king of the Democratic liars. If there was a Hall of Fame for liars, like, let's say, a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, he would be Elvis."

"It just murdered...."

"The spirit of Elvis Presley, I feel it.”"

"He once rode a freight elevator to avoid fans but just as the elevator doors opened, workers were wheeling a deceased guest out on a gurney. “I hope I don’t leave that way,” Elvis quipped."

"Our country faced a similar challenge in the 1950s, when there was widespread apprehension about the safety of the polio vaccine. But when Elvis Presley posed backstage being given the shot before an appearance on the highly rated Ed Sullivan Show, the photo ricocheted across the nation and the world and triggered a rapid increase in vaccination rates."

"So there were portraits of me everywhere, the finest clothes, 150 extras all watching me play this poker game. It just really informed me about who Koumba Diabaté, the diplomat I was playing in the series, really is. So I quickly was able to step into his shoes. But the opulence was ridiculous. We did not decorate those hotel rooms. That’s how the suites are. And it was so fun to shoot there, because you felt Mr. Diabaté’s fascination with Elvis Presley, because where we shot the poker scene was Elvis’s actual bedroom when he stayed there for eight years when it was called The International Hotel. So it was just like living my fantasy within my fantasy. It was so fun to to experience and to feel that energy of how old this place has been, how much history it has, and how much opulence you’re surrounded by. I didn’t have to act because it was literally all there."

"Iconic celebrities never die because they are, in fact, a booming licensing business. Albert Einstein t-shirts. Elvis Presley guitar straps. Marilyn Monroe finger puppets. (These are all real.) If Samuel Jackson can wisecrack his way through Captain Marvel, then a hologram Tom Petty could perform a concert on behalf of a spirits brands at thousands of bars – at the same time. Muhammad Ali could teach your Orange theory boxing class. Julia Child would be in your kitchen with you to co-cook a Thanksgiving turkey on behalf of Butterball. Gone are the days when a celebrity can only be in one place at one time."

"Andy, you have to do me a favor. I have this crazy idea. You know, you always do the paintings of stars ( like Elvis and MM) ? Well, when Maria (Shriver Kennedy) marries me, she will be a star, so you’ll be painting a star."

"I' the King!"

"Elvis, to me, is a symbol of tremendous promise and that kind of American hopefulness, where you can come from nowhere and have nothing and build yourself up and chase that American dream."

"There comes a point when the voice starts to wash over you. You get inside of it, start to really hear what he's doing, and you realise his singing has this extraordinary, effortless quality to it. Sometimes it's like listening to a stream of honey. It's a very smooth ride, the voice of Elvis Presley. I don't think you focus on the words when he's singing. I think he's doing what bel canto singers do – you don't listen to the words, "just" to the beauty of his voice-. When I say "just", that makes it sound as if he's denying you something else but, actually, that's quite enough."

"He had a photographic mind, came prepared every day. I would have to say that if you, Carole, if you had ever have to do a scene with him, you be....... somewhat taken back, that's how his sex appeal hit you. His eyes, especially, so seductive..."

"We went backstage and he told me he used to play me on the jukebox when he was in the Army in Germany. He admired the high tenor male voice – he was a baritone. I was and remain a huge fan of his. He was a phenomenon."

"Well for one thing, he never got to sleep with her in his cover, actually he danced with her. My husband Ewan used to say that it was like Elvis being Romeo down on the ground calling up to Juliet, at the top of the Post Office Tower LOL."

"Little Richard, he was the first one that really got to me. He and, of course, Elvis Presley."

"Lou Reed, Elvis Presley and Kurt Cobain."

"So when the city of Albany came to the conclusion that the house two doors down from my house was structurally terminal after years of neglect, they had to dump a ramp of dirt to allow the excavator to make the climb. It was a thing to behold: The two-track beast would tear away a portion of the front of the house — first the porch, which had been replaced almost a decade ago after it had degraded to a dangerous sag — and then plant its claw deep in the wreckage and haul itself a few feet higher, like a mountaineer with a pickax. By the time it reached the summit, the house had been reduced to a cross-section: see the bedroom, see the attic, see the bathroom where for decades its former residents shaved and showered through the Depression, World War II, the entire life of Elvis Presley and the demise of Skylab."

"He is the Elvis of Racing"

"Halfway through the show, he asked that the house lights be turned up. After that was done he stated that he had told them not to sell the seats to his back and, since they had, he turned around and did the last half facing those of us that had only seen his back for the first. He was a great singer and showman."

"For any strategy to work, people first have to perceive vaccination as a normal part of life. That is why public health officials, nonprofit groups and major brands are collaborating on nationwide public service campaigns and partnering with celebrities to make vaccine more visible. The model for the celebrity shot dates to 1956, when few teenagers were getting the year-old polio vaccine. Two critical things happened that fall to reverse the trend. First, 21-year-old Elvis Presley got the shot in front of cameras before “The Ed Sullivan Show.” Second, the March of Dimes launched a wildly successful peer-to-peer campaign among teen social groups. In short, it leveraged the cool kids, but it may not have gotten the cool kids without the King""

"Elvis would quote Peter Sellers’ lines from "Pink Panther" movies on tour. Things would be going crazy, and he would look at somebody and go, ‘Do you have rhoom?’ " in Sellers’ Inspector Clouseau accent. Or, "Does your dog bite?". Sellers, in turn, was a fan of Elvis, even playing in an Elvis-singing role in his last movie. "The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu""

"The book, by contrast to "White Rage", offers an extended view, spanning from pre-colonial plots to relocate Britain's human rubbish, to Thomas Jefferson's notion of “whiteness as an automatic badge of superiority,” to modern use of adjectives like “redneck,” “cracker” and “country boy,” such as in the specific case of Elvis Presley. Isenberg's greatest historical and sociological intervention is not just the idea that divide and stratification exist between races, or that such divisions habit within them, but that it has always been this way. American democracy has never accorded all the people a meaningful voice. The masses have been given symbols instead."

"He valued his fans and he treated them with respect. If anybody had a reason to be arrogant it would be him, but it's a great lesson for other musicians and people in general and that is the better you get, the more humble you should be. His music resonated with everyone and that's what made him so special, like Elvis Presley or Mozart""

"They have turned Soweto into a Disneyland for Nelson Mandela. They have tried to make him like Elvis Presley. Now with his death, so many foreigners will be going there, then they will say they have seen the real South Africa. Winnie will be there of course "showing off" how close she is to the poor of this country.....”"

"I don't think there is a musician today that hasn't been affected by Elvis' music. His definitive years – 1954–57 – can only be described as rock's cornerstone. He was the original cool ii) That was the standard in my house, he's the only rock 'n' roll guy that dabbled in Christmas"

"It all started when an elderly American woman once asked me: "Do people in South Africa know Elvis?" "Of course we South Africans know Elvis!" I replied. Or do we, really? So, I went on to write a paper and, using a historiographic approach, I attempted to explore how his image was first imported into South Africa, especially during the Apartheid era when there was no television, and media censorship was a fact of daily life. Additionally, I tried to reflect on the impact of the media – then and now – in creating images, fantasies and illusions in constituting the subjectivity of the Elvis of real life and the Elvis of sound, stage and celluloid in the South African musical imaginary."

"Oh yeah, big timeǃǃ"

"An economist called Elvis Presley, who's unfortunately deceased now but made a significant impact on economic thought, in one of his master treatises said: 'A little less conversation, a little more action, please. A little less fight and a little more spark..."

"So Brian, who I was producing then, and I went up to Las Vegas, and we're sitting there watching him and Elvis sings "Runaway", then says that he liked to introduce me to the audience. So, the lights go all over trying to find me, and they can't, until Brian, who is a shy guy gets up and says, "Heeeeeeeeeee's over heeeeeeeeeeeere", and points to me, next to him, in front of the thousands there. So I took a bow. Later we went backstage with him, for two hours and let me tell you, I have never seen a better looking guy in my life."

"I met him in New York during his 2nd appearance on “The Ed Sullivan Show” in 1956. I was just out of the William Morris Agency´s mailroom and still a very junior agent. That night, they held a press conference right before he went on so I went up to him and said, “Elvis, they’re ready for you.”. He said, “Yes sir. I’ll be right there, sir.” I was 24 and he was 21, and I said, “Sir! I’m from the Bronx. You’re the first person in the world to call me sir.” He was the sweetest guy. To this day, I cherish the fact that Elvis Presley was the first person ever to call me sir."

"While many people assume it must have been a difficult slog for an Arab like me to gain acceptance in the Hollywood of the 1960s, I beg to differ. They treated me like a God. I had a beautiful house in Bel-Air, under me was this singer, what was his name, tall super nice guy, he was a very popular singer. I could see his swimming pool. Now I can't remember names of anybody, it's extraordinary. Wait, it was Elvis Presley! So I used to look and see if he had girls in the pool. LOL. And then he died young. I was in the Bel Air house when he died in Memphis, and suddenly the house under me was always empty....’"

"i) I spoke to over 140 songwriters whose work Presley recorded, and most remarked about his uncanny ability to capture the essence and make it his own; like a musical geneticist, he drew from every strand of DNA in a songwriter's work, which ultimately helped shape his own distinctive personal interpretation; just listen to the wide stylistic swath of genre-hopping material he recorded during his career – from Junior Parker's amphetamine-paced rockabilly classic "Mystery Train" and the poppin-perfect panache of Otis Blackwell's "All shook up", to the down and dirty blues swagger of "Reconsider baby" and the operatic grandeur of "It's now or never"-; and then there were more controversial and socially conscious anthems ("If I can dream" and "In the ghetto"), and introspective 70's fare like "Separate ways" and "Always on my my mind"; right away, you can hear the breath of a master stylist who breathed new life into every song he cut" ii) Growing up, Elvis Presley's quasi-gospel ballad "Crying in the Chapel" was the first secular recording allowed inside the Pointer Sisters' strict Church of God in Christ home in West Oakland, California. Ruth, Anita, Bonnie, and June were only allowed to listen to the radio on Sundays. On top of that, it had to be gospel stations. Thank God their mom fancied that song. In an extensive 2006 interview one of the sisters, Anita, reflected on the fact that it was so unbelievable that someone like Elvis could relate to the story in their song 'Fairytale' and want to record it. She thought Elvis did it beautifully and very pleased with his version, capturing the emotion in the song as he did. Ruth Pointer, also spoke positively of Elvis's final album 'Moody Blue' and defended him against charges of any cultural appropriation"

"He is a huge fan of Elvis Presley, even naming his own thirty bedroom mansion "Graceland" after Elvis's Memphis home"

"The Owensboro Police Department quickly responded to my accident in the Meijer parking lot on Sunday, where my dog Elvis, a purebred, had apparently put my truck into drive and hit another parked car. I posted a video on Facebook, explaining how Elvis had shifted the car into drive while trying to get to some bacon grease on the truck's dashboard. Alas, I had left the truck running and forgot to put the emergency brake on. which explained how the truck then rolled up at least four parking spaces, hitting a car parked nearby. Police said there were no charges, so Elvis and I got off scot-free."

"I loved him. There were two icons who changed our life in the 1950's, James Dean and Elvis. He was the first singer who was loved by both girls and guys. He brought us together, boys and girls, a revolutionary, had a profound effect on all of us, culturally, musically emotionally, spiritually, still miss him..."

"I used to watch the way he treated so many people with kindness and respect, the way he used to be so grateful to his fans. He used to say, "Shari, when I wait backstage to go on and I hear all that screaming and I know it's for me, well, sometimes I feel as if my head is going to get real big with all that kind of fuss and stuff. Then I think that my dad drove a truck and that but for the grace of God I'd be drivin' one too. You have to have humility, Shari," he would tell me. "You can never forget who put you where you are and how many people would like to change places with you"."

"I think when I came out of the womb – I've been saying this but I mean it, you're born knowing who Elvis is. The name Elvis is just part of the fabric of humanity. He just is this thing that exists in the air, and contributed obviously so much to music. But I think he is the definition of what's cool.""

"Elvis Presley connects Tupelo, MS to the whole world, the opportunities for cultural and educational exchanges abounding. When I went to Germany, I only talked to two types of people there, those that have been to Tupelo and those that want to come to Tupelo. After learning more about the area, a German tour company decided to turn a day-trip detour from Memphis into an overnighter in the All-America City. Looking to the future, I hope to see continued expansion of the Germany tourist market. City officials there have also agreed to pursue a municipal friendship. I think my there trip certainly will justify the financial costs and will pay dividends for years to come."

"We never saw energy like that coming off a stage before and meeting Elvis afterwards I found him to be a friendly, happy guy. Nice to everyone"."

"At the time, that was in 1972, I thought he was too old for me, but there was this chemistry between us. I felt a lot for him. I got to see him perform in Las Vegas — the greatest performer ever. I'm still really sad we lost him. I wish I could have been a closer friend to help save him. He was truly a kind and gentle man who never truly recovered from the death of his mother."

"He was the first person to truly believe in me as a musician and gifted me with my first tour bus. For the album I am doing “The Day Elvis Died” and “I Want to Live Like Elvis". He gave me words to live by as an artist and to this day, I haven't forgotten them. He told me that if anyone forgets where they came from they're never going to get to where they want to go. He also told me that it was the people who make you who you are, so if you stay true to them, they'll stay with you."

"Graham never forgot his home state of North Carolina or the South, rivaling Coca-Cola and Elvis Presley as the region's top export."

"We went in to scout the Hadooshi farm. We were gathering intelligence; there were quite a lot of buildings and compounds across the whole farm. We could see they were antsy. We went up to the gate, breached it. We caught them off guard. This one woman, she was just mean. Every time we walked through the garden, she went nuts. We noticed the garden was freshly dug. We started moving the dirt around, and we pulled up a big square riveted container. When we came across birth certificates, marriage licenses, we knew it was significant. It was like looking for (and finding) Elvis."

"We all automatically wanted to dress like Elvis, look like Elvis, swagger, strut, and sneer like Elvis – and every snide remark from Aunt Mimi, our teachers, or the newspapers only served to reinforce our new idol's grip"

"“Long Live the King.” A phrase that the founding fathers never wanted the American people to hear again. Recently, the White House’s official Instagram posted an illustration and quote that portrays President Donald Trump as the “King Of America”. Not only is this blatantly un-American, but it is also untrue. There is only one king in America: Elvis Presley."

"Many communities have a “this celebrity slept here” story. As a mountain resort, Idyllwild residents can share many but perhaps the most told is the time Elvis Presley spent three weeks there in 1961 to film “Kid Galahad. Visitors, starting in 2018, can now tour "The Hidden Lodge", built in 1947, one of five restored homes on the tour is one of many Idyllwild locations in “Kid Galahad. It’s the first time it’s been open to the public and it’s a lovely, lovely place. It was something the owners couldn’t pass up. The porch where Presley sang “This is Living” in the film is still intact. People will walk up, sit on the railing and strum their hand like they have a guitar. The home is an homage to Presley without going over the top. In fact, the tour is the Idyllwild Area Historical Society's lone fundraiser and usually draws hundreds of visitors.."

"Our company's breakthrough came in 1933, when one of our microphones was used by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt. This marked the beginning of our association with political, musical, and cultural milestones. A lustrum later, we revolutionized microphone design with the creation of the Model 55 Unidyne, the world’s first single-element dynamic cardioid microphone. Its iconic design would go on to be associated with countless musical legends —think Elvis Presley crooning into its unmistakable grille..."

"I found him sensitive and very good. He felt he could have done better things. His advisors were very much against doing this kind of straight role and they tried to get him to sing throughout the picture. Obviously, they didn't want him to get off the winning horse. But when I was able to calm him down, I thought he gave a beautiful performance..."