Joan Deary & Elvis Presley

[Jungleroom76]

Just found this article over on Elvis Australia regarding Joan Deary and her work with Elvis' catalog at RCA:

http://www.elvis.com.au/presley/joan..._presley.shtml

Very interesting article, particularly the information regarding the finding of Elvis' Tupelo '56 concerts and how she had to reconstruct them.

TCB!
Mike

[King Of The Whole World]

Thanks Mike for posting that article it was very interesting. What a job she had to go thru hours of Elvis material. The interesting points in the article for me were:

250 Million Records sold before his death. This number is always changing in every article you read, this article was back in 1983. I really would like to know the real numbers I don't think we will ever know. The Tupelo concert and how the speed was so messed up. How she was given access to just go thru closets, drawers and rooms. That almost sounds a little fishy to me I don't know if they would let her just go thru the house by herself.

[KPM]

Thanks Mike for posting that article it was very interesting. What a job she had to go thru hours of Elvis material. The interesting points in the article for me were:

250 Million Records sold before his death. This number is always changing in every article you read, this article was back in 1983. I really would like to know the real numbers I don't think we will ever know. The Tupelo concert and how the speed was so messed up. How she was given access to just go thru closets, drawers and rooms. That almost sounds a little fishy to me I don't know if they would let her just go thru the house by herself.

That number is the one I recall seeing very often in the late 60s and until he died.
It is not possible in 2012-to find every sale for Elvis product which took place before the computer tracking age took over.
Like I pointed out elsewhere RCA was not worried about exact figures while he was alive that translated into royaltees to Elvis, so recordkeeping was lax for many reasons.
I recall a news item from 5-10 years ago that stated RCA had found a small warehouse they owned had boxes and boxes of sales records and information dating to the 50s concerning Elvis sales also that Parker had tons of information concerning sales in his files...how much those records and files have been explored is anyones guess.
Its hard trying to unscramble eggs that date back to 1954 especially when you weren't that concerned with saving the recipe to start with.

[Jungleroom76]

Thanks Mike for posting that article it was very interesting. What a job she had to go thru hours of Elvis material. The interesting points in the article for me were:

250 Million Records sold before his death. This number is always changing in every article you read, this article was back in 1983. I really would like to know the real numbers I don't think we will ever know. The Tupelo concert and how the speed was so messed up. How she was given access to just go thru closets, drawers and rooms. That almost sounds a little fishy to me I don't know if they would let her just go thru the house by herself.

I thought that was a little odd myself, especially since Elvis' Aunt Delta was still alive and living at Graceland at the time and it is very well known that she didn't like the fans going through the house, so she must have been beside herself if Joan actually did have access to the house to search for things.

More than likely I would think that most of the stuff she obtained was probably when the judge ordered The Colonel to turn over everything he had following the lawsuit in the early 80's.

TCB!
Mike

[King Of The Whole World]

That number is the one I recall seeing very often in the late 60s and until he died.
It is not possible in 2012-to find every sale for Elvis product which took place before the computer tracking age took over.
Like I pointed out elsewhere RCA was not worried about exact figures while he was alive that translated into royaltees to Elvis, so recordkeeping was lax for many reasons.
I recall a news item from 5-10 years ago that stated RCA had found a small warehouse they owned had boxes and boxes of sales records and information dating to the 50s concerning Elvis sales also that Parker had tons of information concerning sales in his files...how much those records and files have been explored is anyones guess.
Its hard trying to unscramble eggs that date back to 1954 especially when you weren't that concerned with saving the recipe to start with.

Very good points. I guess we might not ever know. Deep inside sometimes I wonder if he really has sold 1 billion plus, I could see 500 or 600 million. I know there have been over the years several in depth articles on this subject.

[King Of The Whole World]

I thought that was a little odd myself, especially since Elvis' Aunt Delta was still alive and living at Graceland at the time and it is very well known that she didn't like the fans going through the house, so she must have been beside herself if Joan actually did have access to the house to search for things.

More than likely I would think that most of the stuff she obtained was probably when the judge ordered The Colonel to turn over everything he had following the lawsuit in the early 80's.

TCB!
Mike

Yeah I just find that a little weird, I think it might make a better story than, EPE sent over 10 boxes of acetates.

[Jungleroom76]

Yeah I just find that a little weird, I think it might make a better story than, EPE sent over 10 boxes of acetates.

Good point my friend...it definitely does make for a better read that she was searching through the house as opposed to FedEx delivered a box of tapes to her office!

TCB!
Mike

[KPM]

Very good points. I guess we might not ever know. Deep inside sometimes I wonder if he really has sold 1 billion plus, I could see 500 or 600 million. I know there have been over the years several in depth articles on this subject.

In the 80s when they began using that number-I wondered also.
But now with all the differering media used to sell Elvis product over the years, reel to reel, 8-tracks, cassettes, cds, 78s, 45s, 33, ....now downloads-plus all the 100s of reissues over the world I truely believe the Billion total.
I bought Aloha From Hawaii on lp, 8-track, and cd..... same with many other albums over the years.
Elvis was king of the singles- his era was all about single sales so the most amazing thing to me is his album totals over his career.

[King Of The Whole World]

In the 80s when they began using that number-I wondered also.
But now with all the differering media used to sell Elvis product over the years, reel to reel, 8-tracks, cassettes, cds, 78s, 45s, 33, ....now downloads-plus all the 100s of reissues over the world I truely believe the Billion total.
I bought Aloha From Hawaii on lp, 8-track, and cd..... same with many other albums over the years.
Elvis was king of the singles- his era was all about single sales so the most amazing thing to me is his album totals over his career.

You are right Elvis is no doubt the King of single sales, not even close.

I hope one of these days on an award show they will have an announcement for the Top 5 Selling Artist of All Time. Our guy will be number one with, I hope a 1.5 billion.