Informații interesante: Elvis Presley

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Video hit Elvis Presley (live, 1956)

Elvis Presley - Don't Be Cruel

"Don't Be Cruel" is a song recorded by Elvis Presley and written by Otis Blackwell in 1956.

It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2002. In 2004, it was listed #197 in Rolling Stone's list of 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

The song is currently ranked as the 92nd greatest song of all time, as well as the fifth best song of 1956, by Acclaimed Music.

Recording

"Don't Be Cruel" was the first song that Presley's song publishers, Hill and Range, brought to him to record.

Blackwell was more than happy to give up 50% of the royalties and a co-writing credit to Presley to ensure that the "hottest new singer around covered it".

Freddy Bienstock, Elvis' Music Publisher, gave the following explanation for why Elvis received co-writing credit for songs like Don't Be Cruel.

"In the early days Elvis would show dissatisfaction with some lines and he would make alterations, so it wasn't just what is known as a 'cut-in'. His name did not appear after the first year.

But if Elvis liked the song, the writers would be offered a guarantee of a million records and they would surrender a third of their royalties to Elvis'."

Presley recorded the song on July 2, 1956 during an exhaustive recording session at RCA studios in New York City. During this session he also recorded "Hound Dog", and "Any Way You Want Me".

The song featured Presley's regular band of Scotty Moore on lead guitar (with Presley usually providing rhythm guitar), Bill Black on bass, D.J. Fontana on drums, and backing vocals from the Jordanaires.

The producing credit was given to RCA's Steve Sholes, although the studio recordings reveal that Presley produced the songs in this session by selecting the song, reworking the arrangement on piano, and insisting on 28 takes before he was satisfied with it. He also ran through 31 takes of "Hound Dog".

Release

The single was released on July 13, 1956 backed with "Hound Dog".

Within a few weeks "Hound Dog" had risen to #2 on the Pop charts with sales of over one million.

Soon after it was overtaken by "Don't Be Cruel" which took #1 on all three main charts; Pop, Country, and R 'n' B.
Between them, both songs remained at #1 on the Pop chart for a run of 11 weeks tying it with the 1950 Anton Karas hit "The Third Man Theme" and the 1951/1952 Johnnie Ray hit "Cry" for the longest stay at number one by a single record from late 1950 onward until 1992's smash "End of the Road" by Boyz II Men. By the end of 1956 it had sold in excess of four million copies. Billboard ranked it as the No. 2 song for 1956.

Presley performed "Don't Be Cruel" during all three of his appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show in September 1956 and January 1957.

The lyrics:

You know I can be found, sittin' home all alone

If you can't come around, at least please telephone

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

Baby, if I made you mad for somethin' I might've said

Please, let's forget the past, the future looks bright ahead

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

I don't want no other love, baby, it's just you I'm thinkin' of

Hmm, don't stop thinkin' of me, don't make me feel this way

Come on over here and love me, you know what I want you to say

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

Why should we be apart, I really love you, baby, cross my heart

Let's walk up to the preacher and let us say, "I do"

Then you'll know you'll have me, and I'll know that I'll have you

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

I don't want no other love, baby, it's just you I'm thinkin' of

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

Don't be cruel to a heart that's true

I don't want no other love

Baby, it's just you I, I'm thinkin' of

Video hit Elvis Presley

Elvis Presley - Return to Sender

Return to Sender is a 1962 rock and roll hit single recorded by American singer Elvis Presley and published by Elvis Presley Music.

The song was written by Winfield Scott and Otis Blackwell.

Recorded on March 27, 1962, at Radio Recorders in Hollywood, it is about a man mailing a letter to his girlfriend after an argument. She continually writes "return to sender" and he keeps receiving the letter with various reasons for returning to sender, including "address unknown" and "no such person". He keeps mailing letters, refusing to believe the relationship is over.

Elvis performed "Return to Sender" in the film Girls! Girls! Girls!.

Featuring Presley's longtime cohorts Barney Kessel on electric guitar, Ray Siegal on double bass, D.J. Fontana on drums, Dudley Brooks on piano, Boots Randolph on baritone saxophone, and the Jordanaires on backing vocals, the song features an opening saxophone bar. Another saxophonist, Bobby Keys, claimed he performed the solo at the instigation of pianist Glen D. Hardin, in his 2012 memoir Every Night's A Saturday Night. However, Hardin did not meet Elvis until February 1970 when he joined his touring band. In addition, his claim is not supported by RCA, Ernst Jorgensen (the official archivist for Presley's recordings), or session logs.

The song peaked at number 1 on the United Kingdom music charts, and number 2 on the American Billboard singles chart, but reached number 1 on the rival Cash Box and Music Vendor singles charts.

"Return to Sender" also went to number five on the R&B charts.

It was the first Christmas number one in Ireland, as the Irish Charts had been founded in October 1962.

The single was certified "Platinum" by the RIAA for sales in excess of 1 million units in the US.

The lyrics:

I gave a letter to the postman,

he put it his sack.

Bright in early next morning,

he brought my letter back.

She wrote upon it:

Return to sender, address unknown.

No such number, no such zone.

We had a quarrel, a lover's spat

I write I'm sorry but my letter keeps coming back.

So then I dropped it in the mailbox

And sent it special D.

Bright in early next morning

it came right back to me.

She wrote upon it:

Return to sender, address unknown.

No such number, no such zone.

This time I'm gonna take it myself

and put it right in her hand.

And if it comes back the very next day

then I'll understand the writing on it

Return to sender, address unknown.

No such person, no such zone.

Asculta azi Elvis

Elvis Presley & Martina McBride - Blue Christmas

Blue Christmas is a Christmas song written by Billy Hayes and Jay W. Johnson. Its tale of unrequited love during the holidays and is a longstanding staple of Christmas music, especially in the country genre. 

Elvis Presley cemented the status of "Blue Christmas" as a rock-and-roll holiday classic by deleting one verse from Tubb's version and recording the remainder on his 1957 LP Elvis' Christmas Album. Presley's version is notable musicologically as well as culturally in that its backing vocalists (especially in the soprano line) replace many major and just minor thirds with neutral and septimal minor thirds, respectively.

In addition to contributing to the overall tone of the song, the resulting "blue notes" constitute a musical play on words that provides an "inside joke" or "Easter egg" to trained ears.

Presley's original 1957 version was released as a commercially-available single for the first time in 1964. This single was a hit in the U.K., making No.11 during the week of 26th December 1964 on the British singles chart, although it didn't achieve chart success in Presley's native U.S.

Elvis and Martina McBride spend a Blue Christmas together.

Martina McBride was just shy of 2 when Elvis Presley filmed his 1968 "comeback" TV special. This year, the country singer steps back in time 40 years to join the King of Rock 'n' Roll in a video for Blue Christmas.

The effect is similar to Celine Dion's American Idol duet with Presley on If I Can Dream in 2007, but producer George Flanigen says the process used for the illusion was entirely different.

"They took Elvis out of the '68 special and put him on the Idol stage," he says. "We were taking Martina to the '68 special."

The posthumous collaboration also appears on Elvis Presley Christmas Duets, a new album that pairs Presley with singers such as Carrie Underwood, Amy Grant and Olivia Newton-John.

In the original footage — the only existing video of Elvis performing a Christmas song — a leather-clad Presley appears with his band on a small stage at the center of a studio audience. In the video, McBride walks out of the audience and sits next to him.

"There's a spot between (guitarist) Scotty Moore and Elvis that's open, like somebody should have been sitting there," says Flanigen. "We're like, 'We could probably figure a way to put her with Elvis.'

"We scoured the footage and picked shots of Elvis throughout the whole special to be able to put them together. There are shots where he and Martina share the frame, where he looks over at her, where she looks back at him and sings and smiles."

McBride filmed her parts in front of a green screen. "It took four weeks" to piece together, Flanigen says.

The lyrics:

I'll have a blue Christmas without you

I'll be so blue just thinking about you

Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree

Won't be the same, dear, if you're not here with me

And when those blue snowflakes start falling

That's when those blue memories start calling

You'll be doing all right with your Christmas of white

But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

You'll be doing all right with your Christmas of white

But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

You'll be doing all right with your Christmas of white

But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

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