I asked my father once what it was like to be a young man when Elvis Presley broke into the music business and his records started getting played on the radio. (I have been a big Elvis fan since I first saw Viva Las Vegas on the 4:00 movie when I was in fourth grade in Knoxville Tennessee. His song "Merry Christmas Baby" is my fave Christmas song.)
Dad got a look on his face like he was eating some bad turnip greens.
"I didn't listen to him. I listened to Frank Sinatra. Didn't like Elvis," Dad said dismissively. [Years later Mom told me they took a record player and one Frank Sinatra album on their honeymoon and they wore that one Frank Sinatra record slap out.]
I was disappointed. I wanted to hear some fun story about the first time Dad heard "Heartbreak Hotel" and he couldn't stop dancing, or something. Fun fact: my parents were known to sometimes do the jitterbug after they'd had a few drinks.
Heck, even my memaw loved Elvis -- she listened to his gospel album until it was worn out. If you've never heard Elvis sing "Peace in the Valley" check it out. My voice teacher said if Elvis had chosen to sing classical music he would have had a big career. (Too bad he settled for a small career.)
Elvis changed the world. He bridged the gap between country, soul, and what would become rock & roll. He imitated "race records" as records by black artists were known in the early 1950's. I love most of Elvis' music. [I must confess, however, that once I heard Big Mama Thornton's version of "Hound Dog" I much preferred Big Mama's rendition. When she sang "you can wag yo tail but I ain't gon' feed you no more" I believed her.]
Dad skipped Elvis. He went right from liking Frank Sinatra to liking Willie Nelson, after we moved from Augusta, Georgia to Knoxville, Tennessee, in 1971. Dad had a 20-30 minute drive from our home in the Knoxville suburbs to the Valley Fidelity Bank in downtown Knoxville every day, and he listened to WIVK, a country station that came in loud and clear. One summer I worked at the bank and rode to work with him every day since I didn't have a car. Eventually I grew to appreciate some country songs, like Willie's version of Stardust. Even though I was not a big country fan. I did appreciate the simple but poignant sentiments Conway Twitty sang about in "I'd Love to Lay You Down" a song with the immortal lyrics "you've got a way of doing little things that turn me on like standing in the kitchen in your faded cotton gown." [Just imagine how excited he got when she wore a nice dress and high heels! She must have had to fight him off so she could cook some fried chicken...]
Now, my musical tastes are all over the place.
I make no apologies for that.
In the mid 1970's my brother bought a cassette tape of the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack and we listened to it until we could sing all the words to classics like Disco Inferno. I liked disco. Don't judge.
When I was a kid my mother bought a series of expensive record sets that she forced me to listen to so I would become familiar with Mozart, Bach, Brahms, Beethoven, and her favorite, Rachmaninoff. I was forced top listen to that music and some of it I actually liked. Mom is why this song -- O mio babbino caro is -- in my opinion -- literally the most beautiful music ever created.
My older brother listened to WIMZ, which played a lot of music with few commercials in the 1970's. So I listened to that too, and I learned to appreciate rock. Funny story. Brother used to leave the radio on a lot and he would fall asleep listening to it. One night he was awakened by a very disturbing sound, the bridge to "Frankenstein" by Edgar Winter, which sounds like the background music to an alien invasion. Bro was joplted awake hearing that and was afraid a spaceship had landed and little green men were going to commence the anal probes, until he woke completely up and turned off the boombox.
I also listened to WNOX, which played pop music and featured Casey Casem's Top 40 countdown every Saturday. I can sing every single word to every pop hit from 1971-80. I remember being able to sing all the words to "Me and Mrs. Jones" when I was about 11 years old. Some might argue I shouldn't have been singing about an extramarital affair but my parents paid no attention to music lyrics and let me listen to (and read) whatever I liked. Compared to today's rap lyrics that song is very tame.
I am lucky now that I work at home and most of the time I can listen to music while I work. I listen to a lot of soundtracks to movies because instrumentals are less distracting. My current faves are the soundtracks to Interstellar and The Cinematic Orchestra's version of Arrival of the Birds & Transformation.
I realized the other day I can sing every word to all the Beatles greatest hits [red album and some of the blue album] while simultaneously analyzing documents.
No matter what your musical taste, music makes life so much richer. I still listen to CD's of my favorite artists like Paul Simon and James Taylor and Mary Chapin Carpenter. I also love going on YouTube and putting in the title of some obscure old pop song and being able to listen to it again. My current re-discovered oldie fave is "Strawberry Letter 23" by The Brothers Johnson.
I will never be as badass as George Jones but I can live with that.
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