Search Results for "Elvis Presley"

Jason Aldean photo courtesy of Broken Bow Records.

If you got the bucks, you can load up the truck with lots of country music memorabilia. Jason Aldean, Carrie Underwood and Montgomery Gentry are among a slew of artists who’ve contributed autographed merchandise to Women Rock For The Cure, a Nashville-based agency that raises money for breast cancer research and awareness.

Jason, Carrie and Montgomery Gentry each put their names on instruments with starting bids that range from $200-$500 at http://myworld.ebay.com/womenrockforthecure. Another guitar bearing signatures from the Oct. 2 Opry Goes Pink night has a $500 minimum. Artists who inked the PRS model include Lorrie Morgan, Terri Clark, Jo Dee Messina, Bill Anderson, Mindy Smith, Connie Smith, Little Jimmy Dickens, The Whites and Caitlin Lynn.

But that’s just a start. Continue Reading

Elvis Presley image used by permission, Elvis Presley Enterprises, Inc.

Had he somehow survived health issues and personal excesses, Elvis Presley would turn 75 in January, and the Country Music Hall of Fame member will be celebrated with the Dec. 8 release of a four-disc, 100-song box set, Elvis 75: Good Rockin’ Tonight.

Featuring an 80-page booklet of photographs and liner notes that place his life and career in cultural context, the collection demonstrates Elvis’ elasticity as an artist. The opening “My Happiness” is a traditional pop song he recorded for his mother before he signed with Sun Records. The track listing includes such rockin’ tracks as “Hound Dog” and “Little Sister,” gospel numbers “Crying In The Chapel” and “How Great Thou Art” and the updated pop re-mix of “A Little Less Conversation.”

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Johnny Cash

Jukebox musicals featuring the songs of Johnny Cash and Elvis Presley have been launched on Broadway in recent years, and their legacies return to the Great White Way next spring in yet another show called Million Dollar Quartet.

The production, currently being presented at Chicago’s Apollo Theatre, revolves around a legendary recording session on Dec. 4, 1956, in which the brightest stars associated with Sun Records — Elvis, Johnny, Jerry Lee Lewis and Carl Perkins — performed songs in an impromptu gathering around the piano at Sam Phillips’ Memphis studio. Continue Reading

Jimmy Wayne photo courtesy of the Valory Music Co.

Celebrity deaths, it’s been said, come in threes, and that was certainly true this week with the passing of Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett and Ed McMahon.

They were not country figures, but each of them had a small level of influence on the genre. And in the middle of their much-covered deaths, the loss of songwriter Tim Krekel — who authored a pair of hits — was overshadowed. Continue Reading

Jessica Simpson photo courtesy of Sony BMG Nashville.

When Jessica Simpson started promoting her first country album last year, she repeatedly told interviewers she had always been a country singer and she was finally making a commitment to the genre. She went so far last summer as to tell The Tennessean she would make country albums in the future, even if she lost her label deal and had to finance them herself.

Now it appears she has a chance to prove whether she was sincere in that statement or if it was promotional gab. A small blog, Country Music Tattle Tale, pointed out Tuesday that her image and materials were no longer available on the Sony BMG Nashville website. The day was filled with rumors of her departure from country music, and indeed, a publicist told Country Aircheck that she was no longer associated with the label’s country division, though she is still in the fold at Epic Records. Continue Reading