 Elvis Presley in his '68 Comeback Special Elvis Presley's '68 Comeback Special is a 1968 United States television special starring Elvis Presley. It was directed by Steve Binder and produced by Binder plus Bones Howe. Sponsored by the Singer Sewing Machine Company, it aired on December 3, 1968 with the title Elvis on the NBC television network. Image File history File links ElvisPresley-OneNight. ...
Image File history File links ElvisPresley-OneNight. ...
See also: 1967 in television, other events of 1968, 1969 in television and the list of years in television. For the American network television schedule, please see 1968-69 American network television schedule. ...
A television special is a television program, typically a short film or television movie intended to debut in prime time, the term used to define any television program which interrupts or temporarily replaces programming normally scheduled for a given time slot. ...
Elvis Aron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977), often known simply as Elvis and also called The King of Rock n Roll or simply The King, was an American singer and actor. ...
Singer Corporation is a sewing machine company located in the United States of America. ...
December 3 is the 337th (in leap years the 338th) day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ...
1968 (MCMLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1968 calendar). ...
NBC (an abbreviation for National Broadcasting Company, its former corporate name) is an American television network based in New York Citys Rockefeller Center and is shown on basic cable in Canada. ...
Since the special was scheduled to be broadcast during the Christmas season, Elvis' manager, Colonel Tom Parker, wanted the show to be little more than Elvis singing Christmas carols. Binder argued that the special needed to reestablish Elvis as a going musical concern after years of formula movies and moderately successful recordings. Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday that celebrates the birth of Jesus. ...
Colonel Tom Parker (b. ...
As part of the program, four one-hour shows were taped at the NBC Studios, Burbank, California. The first two, in which Elvis sat down and jammed with band mates, were recorded on June 27. Each show had a different audience and there was a one hour break between them. In the second two, recorded two days later, he remained standing and sang live to a mix of live and pre-recorded backing, again in front of a studio audience that was changed for the second show. These sessions are often referred to as the Burbank Sessions, the name coming from the titles of two collectible bootleg LPs containing these standup and sitdown shows. The musicians were:
- D.J. Fontana: drumming, using a guitar case
- Alan Fortas: guitar back-slapping, minor vocals
- [[Charlie Hodge: guitar, minor vocals
- Lance LeGault: guitat back-slapping, tambourine
- Scotty Moore: guitars
- The Blossoms: background vocalists (Fanita James, Jean King, Darlene Love), the latter known to worldwide movie audiences as the actress playing Danny Glover's 's wife in the "Lethal Weapon" series.
Filmed in the round before a live audience (Presley's first live performances since 1961), only a small portion of this was included in the televised special. According to Ernst Jorgensen's biography, 'Elvis Presley - a life in music. The complete recording sessions' (1998), Presley overcame extreme nervousness and apprehension about performing live and needed a lot of support and reassurance from Steve Binder to go ahead with a live segment. Presley and the others sat on chairs, playing and singing while interjecting personal stories of his music and early performances. Friends Fortas, LeGault and Hodge were particularly included in the line-up to encourage Presley and keep him at ease. Referring to music and his religious upbringing, in this segment Presley says: "Rock and Roll is basically gospel (music), or Rhythm & Blues (is too). It sprang from that, people have been adding to it." Prior to this, he makes reference to the new groups of the time, like the Byrds and the Beatles, and notes how things have improved and not just changed, like studio engineering. Dominic Joseph Fontana (born March 15, 1931 in Shreveport, Louisiana) is an American musician best known as the drummer for Elvis Presley. ...
Lance LeGault (b. ...
Winfield Scott Scotty Moore III (born December 27, 1931 near Gadsden, Tennessee) is a legendary American guitarist and member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. ...
Darlene Love (born Darlene Wright on July 26, 1938, in Los Angeles, California) is an American popular music singer. ...
Presley sings many of the songs associated with him including: 'That's All Right', 'Heartbreak Hotel', 'One Night', 'Love Me' and 'Are You Lonesome Tonight?'. He also reprises Jerry Reed's 'Baby What You Want Me To Do' on several occasions and includes less well known songs, like 'When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again'. In both sit-down shows, Presley moves to sit between two women at the edge of the stage to sing 'Memories'. Although this was Binder's idea, Colonel Parker had been concerned that Presley might have lost his youth appeal and had decided that young, attractive women should be seen nearest the stage during filming.
The stand-up shows feature Presley performing a similar set by himself, with and without guitar, on a small, internally lit stage floor. Surrounded by admiring fans and backed by an unseen live orchestra, he also sings to a backing track on a few songs that were intended to be integrated into other parts of the show.
Also incorporated into the show was an extravagant musical number featuring Gospel music, and a "mini-movie" centered around the song "Guitar Man". Network censors forced the removal of one segment set in a bordello. The special ends with Presley appealing for world peace with the song "If I Can Dream" (specially commissioned for the show), one of the few protest songs he ever recorded. For other uses, see Gospel (disambiguation). ...
Prostitution is the sale of sexual services (typically manual stimulation, oral sex, sexual intercourse, or anal sex) for cash or other kind of return, generally indiscriminately with many persons. ...
An enormous success, the show was the highest-rated television special of the year. At the beginning of the project, a nervous Presley had said to the executive producer Bob Finkel, "I want everyone to know what I can really do." It is generally accepted by critics that Presley did indeed show what he could do in addition to making successful if uninspired films and soundtracks. The show is widely credited with revitalizing Elvis's career, the live segment giving the audience a glimpse of the charismatic and emotionally charged delivery that won him fans in the 1950s. His career had been considered by many to be artistically fallow since his return from the Army (1960) and the subsequent Beatles invasion. The dominant image of the special is of a tanned and toned Presley in black leather. The costume was preserved and has been on display at Presley's 'Graceland' home in Memphis, Tennessee. The Beatles appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1964 as part of their first tour of the United States, promoting their first hit single there, I Want To Hold Your Hand. ...
Two versions of the special were initially aired by NBC. The first included Presley singing "Blue Christmas" – the only seasonal song Binder agreed to use. When the special was rebroadcast the following summer, this was replaced with a performance of "Tiger Man". Blue Christmas is a christmas song written by Billy Hayes and Jay W. Johnson. ...
In 1984, one of the sit down sessions was released uncut and unedited by Media Home Entertainment, Inc. on a 53 minute video as Elvis - One Night With You while RCA Video Productions made a 42 minute version for television. An album is available as well. The original special itself has also been made available both to television and to home video. The reissued version restores the censored musical numbers from the "Guitar Man" segment, and features both "Blue Christmas" and "Tiger Man". RCAs logo as seen today on many products. ...
In 2004, RCA issued a deluxe DVD release containing every scrap of video footage still in existence from the making of the special, including bloopers, alternate performances, and complete and unedited versions of the four Burbank shows. 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...
DVD (sometimes called Digital Versatile Disc, or Digital Video Disc) is an optical disc storage media format that can be used for data storage, including movies with high video and sound quality. ...
A number of songs were recorded for the special but not used. One of these was a re-recording of "A Little Less Conversation", a track from Presley's then-current film release, Live a Little, Love a Little. This version wouldn't be released for many years, and in 2002 the vocal track from this recording was used as the basis for a popular remixed version of the song, giving Presley his 2nd posthumous #1 hit in Britain (he has now added an additional three, making it a total of 21 times he's been at the top of the British charts, more than anyone in UK chart history). The re mix reached #1 in an additional 20 countries, and was added, at the last minute, to the 4X Platinum album "Elvis 30#1 hits", which has sold in excess of 13 million copies worldwide. "I'll Be Home For Christmas" was also not used in favour of "If I Can Dream". A Little Less Conversation is a song written by Mac Davis and Billy Strange and was originally recorded by Elvis Presley for the movie Live a Little, Love a Little in 1968. ...
Live a Little, Love a Little is a 1968 musical film and comedy starring Elvis Presley. ...
For album titles with the same name, see 2002 (album). ...
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