#epaug16th

I like to entertain people. That's why I pick all my records and try to pick the best songs possible. I try to do the best I can in the movies, with the experience that I've gotten, and everything. But I look at myself strictly as a human being who’s, like I said, has been very lucky, but whose life…I have blood running through my veins…and can be snuffed out in just a matter of seconds, and not as anything supernatural or better than any other human being. -- Elvis.

Elvis backstage at the Riviera Hotel in Las Vegas, May 25, 1972.

From the first quavering notes of the first song that he sang, it was obvious that there was something different about him, something unique - you could detect his influences, but he didn’t sound like anyone else. -- Peter Guralnick.

I’ve never had a singing lesson in my life. No music lesson of any kind, in fact. I just started singing when I was a little kid […] and I’ve been doing it ever since. I was 11 years old when I went in front of a real audience for the first time. It was at a fairground in the town I was born, Tupelo, Mississippi. I was shaking like a leaf, but I’d set my heart on singing, and nothing in this world could have stopped me from going ahead and entering the talent contest at the fair. I did it all on my own, and I didn’t have any idea what I was going to do once I got out there in front of all those people. All I had in my head was the idea that I was going to sing. – Elvis Presley, 1956.

Elvis fans at Graceland, August 1977.

Elvis Presley across the street from Lauderdale Courts in Memphis, c. 1949. Photograph by Margaret Cranfill.

A lovely video tribute sent by recreatethemagic.

They ask me why I wear the clothes I do. What can I say? I just like nice clothes, that's all. I like color and such. Is there something wrong with that?