Hound dog

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Hound dog
Big Mama Thornton
publication 1953
length 2 min 52 sec
Genre (s) Blues , rhythm and blues
Author (s) Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller
Cover version
1956 Elvis Presley

Hound Dog is a rhythm and blues song by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller , written for Big Mama Thornton and first released in 1953. The most successful was the rock 'n' roll interpretation by Elvis Presley from 1956.

Original and first cover versions

Willie Mae 'Big Mama' Thornton - Hound Dog

The song, written by the young songwriting duo Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, was recorded on August 13, 1952 by Big Mama Thornton and the band of Johnny Otis for Peacock Records . It played Devonia Williams (piano), Albert Winston (bass), Pete Lewis (guitar) and Leard Bell (drums). After its first publication in January 1953, the piece reached number 1 on the R&B charts and was able to hold its own for seven weeks. Thornton's version sold 500,000 times but failed to make it onto the pop charts.

The title Hound Dog already indicates ambiguous usability. On the one hand, the hound is meant as a hunting dog , on the other hand, this combination is also used in slang for womanizer or a parasitic gigolo . The overt sexual allusions are continued in the text; Thornton and the band tried everything to emphasize the hunting dog variant with imitation dog barks.

Shortly after the publication of the original, in March 1953 the blues singer Rufus Thomas, who was then under contract with Sun Records, released his slightly lyrically modified version of Bear Cat , which was intended as an answer song. With Sun # 181, Bear Cat was one of the young label's first singles. The specified composer was the producer and label owner Sam Phillips . Due to the striking similarity of the melody to Hound Dog , Sun Records has been successfully sued by Peacock Records for copyright infringement. Sam Phillips then agreed to pay Peacock Records 2 cents for every record sold.

On March 18, 1953 - a month before the original took first place - country singer Betsy Gay initiated a series of country blues- style covers of the song that began in April 1953 with versions by Billy Starr, Tommy Duncan , Eddie Hazelwood, Jack Turner and Cleve Jackson continued.

Elvis Presley's success

Elvis Presley - Hound Dog

The version by Elvis Presley is not based on the previous versions. Music producer Bernie Lowe was also interested in the song, but asked Freddie Bell & The Bellboys to rewrite and smooth out the ambiguous passages. Freddie Bell & The Bellboys released the text-adjusted single on Teen Records # 101 in late 1955 and introduced it during their appearances in Las Vegas .

When Presley performed in Las Vegas in April and May 1956, he heard Hound Dog in the version of Freddie Bell and added the song to his repertoire. He presented the title for the first time on the Milton Berle TV show on June 5, 1956. His rocky and high-level cover version was recorded on July 2, 1956 for RCA Records in New York. The companion volume corresponded to the former live-occupation with Scotty Moore (guitar), Bill Black (bass) and DJ Fontana (drums). The quartet was supported by Gordon Stoker on piano and the Jordanaires in the background. A total of 30 takes were required, of which Take 28 was selected for the single version, which was released on July 13, 1956. This recording was the starting signal for a long and successful collaboration between Presley and the authors Leiber and Stoller.

The song garnered some attention because it was number one in both the American pop , rhythm and blues , and country music charts . This softened the previously existing boundaries between pop music, rhythm and blues and country. With over six million records sold, it was the first successful crossover title in US chart history. The piece stayed at number 1 in the US for eleven weeks . Hound Dog has been a rock'n'roll classic since Presley's version and has been covered at least 53 times.

Other cover versions (selection)

Hound Dog in the movie

The song is part of the soundtrack of numerous feature films such as American Graffiti , Lilo & Stitch or Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull .

In Forrest Gump , a young unknown musician sings the song and is inspired by Forrest Gump, who does some strange dance steps with greaves, for his later famous stage show. It was Elvis Presley; the event is fictional .

Awards

Presley's version of Hound Dog was voted 19th in the Top 500 Songs of All Time by the music magazine Rolling Stone . In 1988 the song was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in this version .

The original version of the song by Big Mama Thornton was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame of the Blues Foundation in 2006 and the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2012.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jessie Carnie Smith / Shirelle Phelps: Notable Black American Women , 1995, p. 642
  2. ↑ Jerry Leiber / Mike Stoller with David Ritz: Hound Dog: The Leiber and Stoller Autobiography , 2009, p. 94
  3. ↑ Rick Kennedy / Randy McNutt: Little Labels - Big Sound , 1999, p. 74
  4. ↑ “Snoopin 'round my door” was replaced by “cryin' all the time”, “You can wag your tail, but I ain't gonna feed you no more” had to be “You ain't never caught a rabbit, and you ain't no friend of mine ”give way. These passages made no sense and distorted the content of the text.
  5. ↑ For a musicological analysis of the version by Elvis Presley s. Ansgar Jerrentrup: Development of rock music from the beginning to the beat . Regensburg: Gustav Bosse Verlag, 1981 (Cologne contributions to music research, vol. 113), also Diss. Phil. University of Cologne 1980, p. 192f; Score transcription of the Elvis version p. 223f
  6. ^ Joseph Murrells: Million Selling Records , 1985, p. 100
  7. ↑ Jeff Tamarkin: Coltrane, Mingus, Tristano Recordings Honored by Grammy Hall of Fame (2012) in ( Memento of the original from October 29, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. JazzTimes @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / jazztimes.com