Elvis Presley Informative Speech

Elvis Aaron Presley was born January 8, 1939, and died august 16, 1977. Elvis was an American singer, musician, and actor. “He was a very popular American singer of the 20th century. Elvis Presley is the best-selling individual artist of all time. He is known as “The king of rock and roll” or just “the king”.” (Elvis 2)

Elvis was born in a two-bedroom house in tupelo, Mississippi. His twin brother, Jessie Garon, left Elvis to grow up as an only child. Elvis and his parents Vernon and Gladys, sewing-machine operator and a truck driver, moved to Memphis, Tennessee in 1948. They attending Pentecostal church, called First Assembly of God, which always had music involved. “Elvis ended up graduating from Humes High School in Memphis, Tennessee

in 1953.” (EP Bio 2)
According to (Rolling Stone 3), “In 1945 Presley won second prize at the Mississippi Alabama Fair and Diary show for his rendition of Red Foleys “Old Shep”.” Elvis loved to hear Furry Lewis and B.B.

King, so he always hung around the black section of town where B.B. King performed. Following graduation in June 1953, Presley drove a truck for Crown Electric; he had planned to drive a truck for his whole life. He ended up growing his hair out, and dressing like a truck driver. “That summer he decided to record two songs; “My Happiness” and “That’s Where Your Heartaches Begin” at Memphis Recording Service, where anyone could record a 10-inch acetate for four dollars.” (EP Bio 3)

Stated by, (Rolling Stone 4), “Elvis Presley was an international sensation by 1956; at that time Elvis was known as “The King of Rock and Roll”. Presley was Rock and Rolls first real star. He was a hip-shacking symbol for American in the 1950s. Elvis sang everything from Blues laced with country and country laced with gospel. He brought music together from both sides of the color line and performed with a natural sexuality, which made him a teen idol and role model. Many parents said he was vulgar, incompetent, and was a bad influence on their

children.

Elvis starred in 33 successful films, which made history with his television appearances. He has sold over one billion records. According to (Rolling Stone 4), “Elvis’s American sales have earned him gold, platinum or multi-platinum awards. Throughout his career he earned 14 Grammy nominations (3 wins).”
November 1959, at a party in Bad Nauheim in Germany, Priscilla and Elvis met. Priscilla was 14 ½ years old. Priscilla ended up moving to Graceland in early 1963. December 1966, Elvis formally proposed to Pricilla. Elvis gave her an engagement ring with a three-and-a-half-carat diamond that was surrounded by a row of smaller diamonds. They set the date of the marriage on May 1, 1967 in Milton Prell’s suite at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. The maid of honor was Michelle Beaulieu and best men were Marty Lacker and Joe Esposito. According to (Marriage.about.com), “Presley wore a black brocade silk tuxedo and western boots, while Priscilla wore a floor-length wedding gown of her own design: white silk chiffon, with beaded yoke, trimmed in seed pearls and topped with a three-foot tulle veil secured by a rhinestone crown.” Their honeymoon was in Palm Springs, California. Priscilla was twenty-one and Elvis was thirty-two when they married. They held their second wedding reception at Graceland on May 29, 1967 for family and friends who could not make it to Las Vegas.

Elvis and Priscilla had one daughter; her name was Lisa Marie Presley, born February 1, 1968 in Memphis, Tennessee. Lisa has been married four times, having two children with her first husband Danny Keough, they had one girl named riley and a son named Benjamin.

In 1971, problems in the marriage of Pricilla and Elvis escalated. February 23, 1972, they separated. Their separation was official in July 1972. The divorce was granted on October 9, 1973 at the Los Angeles Superior Courthouse in Santa Monica, California. Stated by, (peter Guarlanick, Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley, page 541), “Elvis about his divorce “Our divorce came about not because of another man or another woman but because of the circumstances involving my career. I was traveling too much. I was gone too much.”” After the divorce Pricilla met another person named Nacarone Garibaldi a screenwriter and director Marco Gardibaldi, they had a son together on March 1, 1987.

“Elvis died of a cardiac arrhythmias; legend has it that he was sitting on the talent. The laboratory reports show he was taking to many different kinds of drugs.” (EP Bio 4) They found 14 different types of drugs in his systems. Elvis had a bad history of disrupted sleep, from nightmares going back to childhood. It all started after his mother’s death and when he was drafted to the army in 1957. Elvis had become a “night person” from taking an amphetamine, which keep you up and that is how he kept his weight down.

In 1969, Elvis would perform two concerts nightly at the International Hotel in Las Vegas; he would take amphetamines before the concert and tranquilizers afterwards. It is said that Dr. Nichopoulas would try to help Elvis get off the medicine when he was home but when he was in LA, there was no other doctor to help him. Elvis thought that if he was getting it from the doctor than he was not like all the other junkies in the world. If he was having a good show he would always ask someone for a pill or two, and the extra pills would end up being placebos.

Elvis favorite painkiller was Dilaud d, one of the most powerful kinds you could get. Elvis Presley died on august 16, 1977 from glaucoma, high blood pressure, liver damage and an enlarged colon. All of those symptoms were, caused by of coarse drug abuse. Elvis had no major heart problems. It surprised everyone that he died. In September 1079, Dr. Nick was held criminally responsible for Elvis’s death, from the illegal prescription of painkillers and other drugs he wrote to Elvis and many more artists.