Explores the factors — musical and cultural — that led to the birth of American rock 'n' roll music in the early 1950s. Covers in detail the genres, styles and people that converged to create this new music.
Memphis: Part 3
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From the course by University of Florida
Music's Big Bang: The Genesis of Rock 'n' Roll
44 ratings
From the lesson
A tale of three cities: Memphis
The delivery room of rock 'n' roll
Meet the Instructors
Professor David CarlsonExecutive Director of the Center for Media Innovation + Research and Cox/Palm Beach Post Professor of New Media Journalism
College of Journalism & Communication: Center for Media Innovation
As I mentioned last time, in 1955,
Elvis met an illegal immigrant named Andreas van Kuijk,
who changed his name to Colonel Tom Parker.
He was an experienced concert promoter who was just starting a talent
management business.
And he heard through the grapevine that this kid in Memphis named Elvis was
creating a buzz.
He went up there and he sweet talked Elvis into having a manager and
into inking a deal with Parker.
Elvis was a nice guy, as I said before.
And that was part of the problem.
And Parker, persuaded Sam Phillips to release Elvis Presley
from Sun Records so that he could move to a bigger label.
Phillips thought, in order for
him to have a successful future in the business, he would need some money.
Sam Phelps asked for what he thought was an astronomical amount.
He said he would sell Elvis' contract for $40,000.
And believe it or not, RCA said sure.
So, here is Elvis Presley shaking hands with the president of RCA.
Now I'm sure that you are asking yourself, was Sam out of his mind?
It depends, really, on how you see it.
$40,000 was a lot of money in 1956.
But looking back, considering Elvis's potential and
talent, would you give him up for $40,000?
Probably not.
But I don't mean to judge Sam Phillips.
Sam Phillips was a genius at finding talent.
But it was certainly a questionable business decision to let go of Elvis.
Nobody knows whether Elvis could have become as big as he did
had he stayed with Sun Records.
So I don't really mean to be judging Sam Phillips here.
And on bright note, Sam recruited other future legends and
had the money to grow his business.
So it was a win-win strategy in the end.
Now the Colonel basically exploited Elvis and used him to his advantage.
He took half of all of Elvis's earnings,
even after his death, cashing in on merchandising and publishing rights.
Now a common profit percentage going to a manager is somewhere between 15 and 25%,
depending on the managers experience and success.
Now, to be fair, I should say there are some people who believe Colonel Parker
masterminded talent management that involved every facet of Elvis' life.
And was central to Elvis' success.
Presley himself said of Parker, I don't think I'd
every have been very big if it wasn't for him, he's a very smart man.
RCA cut the ties with the musicians and producer Elvis had worked with.
Sam Phillips still could have been his producer, but it didn't happen.
RCA thought it knew best, being the big multi-national company.
At RCA, Elvis was partnered with mediocre producers,
journey musicians and less than great backing singers.
He still had Scottie Moore and
Bill Black on some of the recordings, but they were merely two of many musicians.
Not really deeply involved in creating the music.
But he did have great songwriters to work with.
And RCA's move got other labels to begin thinking seriously about rock n' roll.
Elvis' breakthrough year was 1956.
Mayborn Axton was the co-writer of Elvis' first number one pop hit,
Heartbreak Hotel.
She was a Nashville area songwriter called the Queen Mother of Nashville.
And it was Tom Parker who found her, got her to write the song, and
made this all happen.
So go figure.
>> [MUSIC]
>> This record is a milestone.
Hound Dog was released with Don't Be Cruel on the flip side and
both songs together, as a package, went to number one.
Both songs credited as number one records.
Hound Dog and Don't Be Cruel, you'll want to remember that too.
The chart duration was 11 weeks at the top.
Number one in the pop chart, and the country and western chart,
and the rhythm and blues chart.
The first record in history to do that.
>> [MUSIC]
>> 11 weeks at number 1 is a record that stood for a long time.
It finally was broken in 1992 by Boyz II Men's End of the Road.
Kind of a fitting song to break it I guess.
Now Hound Dog was actually written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller,
one of the greatest songwriting teams in all of history.
More on them later in the class.
But here's the original by Big Mama Thornton, I promised you earlier.
>> [MUSIC]
>> Now, Elvis followed up with Don't Be Cruel and Love Me Tender.
These songs all were number one hits in 1956.
That's just about as big a success as anyone can have in one year.
>> [MUSIC]
>> On September 9th, 1956, Elvis Presley first appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show.
Some say that is the most significant date in all of rock and roll history
because it brought rock and roll and Elvis to the attention of mainstream America.
Now it wasn't his first TV appearance though, he had appeared a few times
before during 1956, most notably on the the Milton Berle show.
At the end of 56, Presley was hanging out at Sun Records because he
was still good friends with Sam Phillips.
After all he owed his career to Sam and history was made that day in December.
These four guys got together and
started jamming, was arguably the first super group.
The recordings were of an impromptu jazz session among Elvis Presley,
Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, and
Johnny Cash, all of course who had been Sun Records signees.
It is said to have happened purely by coincidence, and
nothing was commercially released out of the session until fairly recently.
The taping was largely unintended by the quartet.
They were just singing the songs they had in mind, having some fun.
About 40 titles were recorded, believe it or note.
Most of them are incomplete, but this meeting was significant in that it brought
four future legends of rock and roll together in one place at one time.
So, the million dollar.
Remember the name.
When we come back, Elvis in 1957.
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