Love Me Tender
Love Me Tender is the title of a song by the American singer Elvis Presley from 1956. The original is called Aura Lee , dates back to 1861 and became an evergreen thanks to numerous cover versions .
History of origin
Origin as minstrel music
The former William Whiteman Fosdick lawyer (text) and in 1835 from England immigrant George A. Poulton (music) have in 1861 at the beginning of the American Civil War, a song called Aura Lee (alternatively Aura Lea ) written for the Holley & Campbell Minstrels, who hereby appeared in minstrel shows. Music publisher J. Church registered the US copyright for the song on May 1, 1861 . By the time Aura Lee became widely known, the Civil War had just begun. The romantic ballad is about the description of a pretty girl with shiny hair. The Holley & Campbell Minstrels also performed among the soldiers. This made the ballad popular in military circles and became a soldier's song . As such, it was played in the famous West Point Academy with new text (by LW Becklaw) under the title Army Blue, especially in graduating classes from 1865 onwards.
Use in motion pictures
The song Aura Lee later appeared in several films. First it was sung by Frances Farmer in the civil war drama Come and Get It (came in US cinemas on November 6, 1936; German version: Take what you can get ), but not pressed on record. Then he appeared in the western The Last Musketeer (March 1, 1952) and finally in The Long Gray Line (February 9, 1955; With body and soul ) as a West Point song. Aura Lee's first record was a country version by the Shelton Brothers , recorded on February 17, 1937.
Elvis Presley
Film basis
On April 1, 1956, Elvis Presley's manager Colonel Tom Parker signed a film offer submitted by film producer Hal B. Wallis for Presley, which provided for the production of three films. The first of these films was initially led under the working title The Reno Brothers . However, by the time filming began on August 22, he had already adopted the final film title Love Me Tender (February 1, 1957; gun smoke and hot songs ). Kenneth Lorin Darby wrote the entire four-song score for the post-Civil War western. He also adapted the Aura Lee that fits into the film story and wrote a more contemporary romantic ballad text for the folk song. On October 8, 1956, filming was completed.
Music track
For the song Love Me Tender Presley was on August 24, 1956 in the recording studio of 20th Century Studios (Los Angeles). Film music composer Darby rejected the usual accompaniment from Presley ( Scotty Moore , Bill Black and DJ Fontana ) because she did not seem worthy of his film music; instead, Presley was accompanied by the Ken Darby Trio. It consisted of Vita Mumolo (guitar), Charles Prescott (bass) and Red Robinson (drums); Jon Dodson did the backing vocals.
The song is simply orchestrated and arranged in the original recording. In addition to Presley's voice, only a relatively monotonous guitar accompaniment can be heard. The vocals are slightly underlaid with reverb. The 2nd take was selected by producer Steve Sholes for the planned single. Even before the official release of the song, Elvis presented the title Love Me Tender on September 9, 1956 on the Ed Sullivan Show , which was seen by 54 million viewers. That triggered 800,000 pre-orders for the single.
It wasn't until October 6, 1956, that Love Me Tender / Any Way You Want Me (That's How I Will Be) ( RCA Records # 47-6643) appeared on the market and initially sold over one million copies, a total of over 3 million. The ballad stayed in first place for five weeks, displacing the Elvis title Don't Be Cruel / Hound Dog from first place. When she first came first on November 3, 1956, the film had not yet been released; the film premiered on November 15, 1956. Love Me Tender received a BMI award. By the end of the year, Presley had sold over ten million singles, making Presley singles accounted for about 2/3 of all RCA record sales.
Records
Presley has Love Me Tender to thank for three of its chart records: for the first time in Billboard history, a single by the same artist, Presley's Hound Dog , had toppled the charts. The second record was that for the first time an artist had managed to occupy both top positions in the American charts. After all, it was, Hound Dog and Love Me Tender put together, the longest time an artist had stayed at the top of the Billboard charts without a break, namely 16 weeks. Later releases of the single also made it into the hit lists again and again.
Missing stanza
According to the script of the film Love Me Tender , Presley's character had to die in the end. With a conciliatory additional verse of the song Love Me Tender , which Presley sings "from heaven" with a large orchestra, the US teenagers, angry because of the film death of their idol, should be reassured. This verse can not be heard on the single extracted from the soundtrack , but was only released on record years later as part of the Essential Elvis series .
Authorship
Elvis Presley and Vera Matson were registered as official composers with BMI . Neither of them were the real authors of the song. Ken Darby wrote the lyrics and is the arranger of the music because at that time Aura Lee's melody was already in the public domain . The powerful Presley manager Parker made sure that Darby agreed to the "cut-in" to register Presley as a co-composer without Presley having his own intellectual contribution to the song. This "cut-in" was not uncommon in the beginning with Presley records (and also in other pop music). It should be explained that a total of 51 music tracks for Elvis Presley as a composer are registered with BMI by copyright. According to the American Music Preservation, Presley had little artistic influence on the arrangements of the third-party compositions, which was too small to cross the copyright threshold as a co-author. Vera Matson was the wife of Ken Darby, so two authors are formally registered who had made no contribution to the creation of the song.
Cover versions
Peter Moesser wrote a German text for Gerhard Wendland under the title Always again I love you , which Wendland recorded for Polydor (# 50 395) on January 24 and 25, 1957. Jim Reeves picked up the original song in 1959 under the original title Aura Lee . Connie Francis brought Love Me Tender on the LP Never on Sunday in October 1961 out. Other versions are from Lettermen (October 1962), Pat Boone (September 1963), Platters (August 1964), Marty Robbins (LP My Woman My Woman My Wife , March 1970), Merle Haggard (October 1977), Linda Ronstadt (September 1978), Kenny Rogers (August 1989), Tony Bennett (October 1994) or Frank Sinatra (LP Trilogy ; recorded August 21, 1979, released March 1980). There was an appearance on the television show Welcome Home Elvis , shot in Miami on March 26, 1960 , which marked Presley's return to show business after serving in the army, in which Frank Sinatra gagged a Sinatra-style Presley number and Elvis Presley Alternating a Presley-style Sinatra number. Nelson Riddle arranged a potpourri of Sinatra's hit Witchcraft and Elvis Presley's Love Me Tender . Coverinfo lists a total of 79 versions.
Individual evidence
- ↑ The beginning of the war was April 12, 1861
- ^ Tony Russell, Country Music Records: A Discography 1921-1942 , 2008, p. 828.
- ^ A b Fred Bronson, The Billboard Book of Number One Hits , 1985, p. 15
- ↑ Peter Guralnick / Ernst Jorgensen, Evis Day By Day , 1999, p. 82.
- ↑ the rest of the movie songs were Poor Boy , We're Gonna Move and Let Me
- ↑ Pamela Clarke Keogh, Elvis Presley: The Man, The Life, The Legend , 2004, p. 89.
- ^ Joseph Murrells, Million Selling Records , 1985, p. 101
- ↑ Love Me Tender , RIAA certification
- ^ Roger Lee Hall: Love Me Tender , American Music Preservation
- ↑ Elvis Presley ( Memento of the original from December 18, 2015 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. , BMI entry
