Purpose
Generally, Presley's 1960s soundtrack recordings command the least regard among the singer's recorded work. The most successful commercially, such as G.I. Blues and Blue Hawaii, fell in the tradition of the film musical as it had developed through the 1950s, that of the integrated musical where the songs are integral to the story line. Hence, songs such as "Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce" from Girl Happy or "There's No Room to Rhumba in A Sports Car" from Fun in Acapulco made no sense outside of their movies and hardly found a place in Presley's stage act, or could ever be considered classics along the lines of "Jailhouse Rock" or "Love Me Tender", whose films were not integrated musicals. As stated by Susan Doll in the liner notes, the songs from the soundtracks are often judged by inappropriate criteria:
- ...this type of (integrated) musical was standard fare in Hollywood for decades. However, those who criticize Elvis' musical vehicles generally overlook this, preferring to attack the songs as being inferior to his non-movie output...
This package, collating 62 of the approximately 225 songs released in association with the films, selects in many cases those numbers that can stand outside of their film vehicles, concentrating on title tracks and songs that had been also released as singles immediately prior to the release of the soundtrack.
All selections recorded at Radio Recorders, Western Recorders, Paramount Recording Stage, MGM Studios, Samuel Goldwyn Studio, United Artist Recorders, Decca Universal Studio, and RCA Studios in Hollywood, RCA Studio B in Nashville, Tennessee. Original recordings produced by Joseph Lilley, Urban Thielmann, Hans Salter, Jeff Alexander, George Stoll, Gene Nelson, Fred Karger, Felton Jarvis, Billy Strange, Hugo Montenegro, Billy Goldenberg, and Leith Stevens. Discographical information below taken from Elvis Presley A Life in Music: The Complete Recording Sessions, by Ernst Jorgensen, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1998.
Read more about this topic: Command Performances: The Essential 60s Masters II
Famous quotes containing the word purpose:
“A major misunderstanding of child rearing has been the idea that meeting a child’s needs is an end in itself, for the purpose of the child’s mental health. Mothers have not understood that this is but one step in social development, the goal of which is to help a child begin to consider others. As a result, they often have not considered their children but have instead allowed their children’s reality to take precedence, out of a fear of damaging them emotionally.”
—Elaine Heffner (20th century)
“How still the evening is,
As hushed on purpose to grace harmony!”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“The United States is the only great nation whose government is operated without a budget. The fact is to be the more striking when it is considered that budgets and budget procedures are the outgrowth of democratic doctrines and have an important part in developing the modern constitutional rights.... The constitutional purpose of a budget is to make government responsive to public opinion and responsible for its acts.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)