GirlHappy19
02-16-2008, 06:32 PM
February 15, 2008 10:26:39 PMMan who sang backup for Elvis to sing at area churches
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Ed Hill and Elvis on stage during a performance. (Photo contributed / Ed Hill)
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By Rex Barber
Press Staff Writer
rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com (rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com)
link to source (http://www.johnsoncitypress.com/phpbb2/)
There are not too many left who remember singing with the king.
But Ed Hill knew Elvis Presley personally, as a friend and an employer.
Hill was a backup singer for Elvis from 1974 until his death in 1977.
“In 1974 I went with J.D. Sumner and the Stamps Quartet, who were with Elvis already,” Hill said. “In fact, I sang at his funeral.”
Hill will be in the area on March 2, to sing gospel music at Tri-Cities Church of God in Piney Flats in the morning and at Roan Street Church of God in Elizabethton that night. “I’ll be singing at the churches,” he said. “I do singing at churches Sunday morning and Sunday night three weeks a month. The rest of the time I’m at home.” His home is in Nashville. He did live in Elizabethton for a time back in the 1950s and even recovered from heart surgery in Hampton several years ago. “I enjoy that area,” he said. “I only lived there three or four years, but that’s the only place I feel like home.”
He started singing professionally in 1959. He also went to East Tennessee State College for two years in the 1950s, staying only long enough in Elizabethton to meet and marry his wife, he said. Eventually, he was lucky enough to become a singer in Elvis’ performances. “When I went with the Stamps, J.D. Sumner, he’d been there about three years performing, and he said ‘treat Elvis like one of the guys.’ And I said ‘how do you do that, he’s a superstar,’ ” Hill said.
“And we would back him up on all his songs and we would open every Elvis performance with about 25 minutes of music with the Stamps. He loved gospel music about as much as anyone.” Hill said sometimes after shows Elvis would want to sing in hotel rooms. “We have sang Southern gospel music with him and for him almost all night long, sometimes until 8 in the morning,” Hill said. “We wanted him to go to bed.”
Though he knows Elvis’ songs, Hill will not be performing them at his appearances in March. But he will sing one of Elvis’ favorites. “I only sing one song that he loved called ‘His Hand in Mine,’ ” he said. “I sing that every time I go to a church.”
Hill had no problem with singing what was considered rock ’n roll back then. "What Elvis sang back then was rock ’n roll but it’s not what rock ’n roll is today,” he said. “You know even today people want to hear Elvis just like he did it back then and he’s been gone 30 years.”
If you ever attended an Elvis concert, you probably recall an announcer saying “Ladies and gentlemen, Elvis has left the building. Thank you and good night.” That voice belonged to Hill. “I thought it was a one-time deal,” he said of the announcement of Elvis’ departure. “And I agreed to do it if I didn’t have to go out on stage and do it.” He would usually give 20 or 30 seconds for Elvis to get to his limousine parked in back before making the announcement.
He remembers the day Elvis died. He was waiting to go on tour with him again in the airport in Nashville.“We were over there waiting for him and they said due to an act of God, the tour has been canceled,” Hill said.
He and the others went home thinking a relative of Presley’s had died. When he turned the television on, he found out it was Elvis who had passed.
“We could hardly believe it was him,” Hill said.
Presley died more than three decades ago now, but Hill can still remember being treated with the utmost kindness from the “King of Rock ’n Roll.”
He said when he auditioned for the position as a backup singer, Elvis kept looking at him throughout. He thought the job was lost. “About halfway through the program he walked over and shook my hand and said welcome to the family,” Hill said. “He loved all the people that sang with him.”
The brief time Hill spent with Presley at the end of his career is something he is grateful for. “It’s something a lot of folks would give anything to do and it was a huge privilege to have a friend called Elvis Presley, not only a superstar, he was, but he was also a friend,” Hill said.
http://www.johnsoncitypress.com/images/common/shim.gifhttp://www.johnsoncitypress.com/images/Pics/Articles/LPic-EdHil-Elvis_265.jpghttp://www.johnsoncitypress.com/images/common/shim.gif
Ed Hill and Elvis on stage during a performance. (Photo contributed / Ed Hill)
http://www.johnsoncitypress.com/images/common/shim.gif
By Rex Barber
Press Staff Writer
rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com (rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com)
link to source (http://www.johnsoncitypress.com/phpbb2/)
There are not too many left who remember singing with the king.
But Ed Hill knew Elvis Presley personally, as a friend and an employer.
Hill was a backup singer for Elvis from 1974 until his death in 1977.
“In 1974 I went with J.D. Sumner and the Stamps Quartet, who were with Elvis already,” Hill said. “In fact, I sang at his funeral.”
Hill will be in the area on March 2, to sing gospel music at Tri-Cities Church of God in Piney Flats in the morning and at Roan Street Church of God in Elizabethton that night. “I’ll be singing at the churches,” he said. “I do singing at churches Sunday morning and Sunday night three weeks a month. The rest of the time I’m at home.” His home is in Nashville. He did live in Elizabethton for a time back in the 1950s and even recovered from heart surgery in Hampton several years ago. “I enjoy that area,” he said. “I only lived there three or four years, but that’s the only place I feel like home.”
He started singing professionally in 1959. He also went to East Tennessee State College for two years in the 1950s, staying only long enough in Elizabethton to meet and marry his wife, he said. Eventually, he was lucky enough to become a singer in Elvis’ performances. “When I went with the Stamps, J.D. Sumner, he’d been there about three years performing, and he said ‘treat Elvis like one of the guys.’ And I said ‘how do you do that, he’s a superstar,’ ” Hill said.
“And we would back him up on all his songs and we would open every Elvis performance with about 25 minutes of music with the Stamps. He loved gospel music about as much as anyone.” Hill said sometimes after shows Elvis would want to sing in hotel rooms. “We have sang Southern gospel music with him and for him almost all night long, sometimes until 8 in the morning,” Hill said. “We wanted him to go to bed.”
Though he knows Elvis’ songs, Hill will not be performing them at his appearances in March. But he will sing one of Elvis’ favorites. “I only sing one song that he loved called ‘His Hand in Mine,’ ” he said. “I sing that every time I go to a church.”
Hill had no problem with singing what was considered rock ’n roll back then. "What Elvis sang back then was rock ’n roll but it’s not what rock ’n roll is today,” he said. “You know even today people want to hear Elvis just like he did it back then and he’s been gone 30 years.”
If you ever attended an Elvis concert, you probably recall an announcer saying “Ladies and gentlemen, Elvis has left the building. Thank you and good night.” That voice belonged to Hill. “I thought it was a one-time deal,” he said of the announcement of Elvis’ departure. “And I agreed to do it if I didn’t have to go out on stage and do it.” He would usually give 20 or 30 seconds for Elvis to get to his limousine parked in back before making the announcement.
He remembers the day Elvis died. He was waiting to go on tour with him again in the airport in Nashville.“We were over there waiting for him and they said due to an act of God, the tour has been canceled,” Hill said.
He and the others went home thinking a relative of Presley’s had died. When he turned the television on, he found out it was Elvis who had passed.
“We could hardly believe it was him,” Hill said.
Presley died more than three decades ago now, but Hill can still remember being treated with the utmost kindness from the “King of Rock ’n Roll.”
He said when he auditioned for the position as a backup singer, Elvis kept looking at him throughout. He thought the job was lost. “About halfway through the program he walked over and shook my hand and said welcome to the family,” Hill said. “He loved all the people that sang with him.”
The brief time Hill spent with Presley at the end of his career is something he is grateful for. “It’s something a lot of folks would give anything to do and it was a huge privilege to have a friend called Elvis Presley, not only a superstar, he was, but he was also a friend,” Hill said.