ELVIS ON PERFORMING

Q: When did you first start singing? Do you call it singing – the stuff you do?

EP: Do I call it singing?

Q: Yeah, that is what you call it, right?

EP: Well I’ve sold 5 million records, somebody calls it singing (laughs).

Q: I mean this is what the critics say, I guess you read it all the time.

EP: Well, I’ll tell you, this is the only explanation I’ve got for it is people always – I get a lot of criticism for the actions I use on stage – I have been doing it for two years – I’ve been doing the same thing for two years -- and it just got in the last 4 or 5 months that I’ve got criticism. I guess it’s because my records have become bigger and everything. In other words, the more popular you are, the more criticism you get. But in other words, people can stay home and hear you sing. When they pay their money to come out and see you in a personal appearance, those people want to see a show. They come out to see some action. And if I stood up in front of an audience and did nothing but sing, if I didn’t put on a show and if I didn’t act like I enjoy what I was doing, they wouldn’t come out to see me the next time I went back.

Q: Do you really enjoy being up there on stage as much as you seem to?

EP: I get such a thrill out of it I wear myself completely out. And sometimes we have 3 or 4 shows a day -- it’s the same thing as a fighter going into the ring 3 times in one night – and not many fighters will do it (laughs).

Q: Were you self-conscious when you first started? Did you have stage fright at all?

EP: Well I still do. And I’ve been in front of a lot of audiences. But I always get nervous.

Q: Are you nervous throughout the show?

EP: After the first couple of songs I feel okay, But I always go out with the thought on my mind are they going to like me. Or are they going to throw rocks at me or something like that.

Q: Do you think your style of singing is different from anybody else’s or do you follow a pattern? Do you sing, like Johnny Ray, for instance?

EP: Oh no. No, I don’t pull my hair and roll on the floor (laughs).

Q: Do you feel that this is your style alone, the way you sing?

EP: Well I mean I don’t know. I have never heard a style like it. I mean. I’m not saying that it’s good or nothing like that. I mean I have never heard anything, -- I’ve never copied anybody. I just originated it accidentally more or less. When I was called to make my first record, I went into the studio and I started singing I started jumping up and down. And I wasn’t even aware of it, my legs were shaking all over. And then after my first record became a hit, well, I was on this big jamboree in Memphis at an open air theater And I came out on stage and I was scared completely stiff. And my band, we all looked like a bunch of dead people, we were scared so bad. I guess there were 4 or 5,000 people in the audience. And we….

Q: They’ll telling me where running out of time.

EP: Let me go ahead and finish this. Anyway I came out on stage and I was singing a couple of rock and roll songs, and the audience go to hollering and squealing with me --and they had been very quiet through the whole show, and I was the last one on the show, and they had been very quiet -- and the audience started squealing and I left the stage and they kept calling me back. And I didn’t know what I was doing that they liked -- because I never even thought about it…. And my manager told me, he said, "Go back out there and just do what you’ve been doing." And so I asked him, I said, "What have I been doing?" And he said, "You’ve been shaking all over. Your legs have been shaking with the music, your eyes twitching, your shoulders twitching and everything." And so I stuck with it and I’ve been doing it ever since.

Q: Do you really think you have a good voice or do you think you’ve been successful primarily because of your stage technique?

EP: That’s a pretty tough question there. I have never thought I had a good voice -- I just, well, I enjoy what I’m doing, you know. I put my heart, soul and body into it. But I guess one of the reasons people like it because it was a little something different.

VERNON PRESLEY, IN 1971, ON ELVIS'S EARLY DAYS