July 18, 1953(Saturday)-Elvis Presley strolls into Memphis' Sun Studio to record a tune for his mother. Owner Sam Phillips is impressed with the white boy with the 'negro sound."
Ed Leek say on August 22, 1953(Saturday). According to the 'Memphis Recording Service Volume 1' the date of this demo session is August 22 1953.
SUN RECORDING STUDIO, 706 UNION AVENUE, MEMPHIS, TENNESSEE. SUN SESSION: MONDAY AUGUST 3, 1953
01 - "SOFTLY AND TENDERLY" = Matrix number: - U 82 - Master = Recorded: - August 3, 1953 = Released: - September 1953
First appearance: - Sun Record (S) 78/45rpm single SUN 189-B mono = SOFTLY AND TENDERLY / MY GOD IS REAL
02 - "MY GOD IS REAL" = Matrix number: - U 81 - Master = Recorded: - August 3, 1953 = Released: - September 1953
First appearance: - Sun Records (S) 78/45rpm standard single SUN 189-A mono = MY GOD IS REAL / SOFTLY AND TENDERLY
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On July 18, 1953, Elvis Presley first went to the Memphis Recording Service at the Sun Record Company, now commonly known as Sun Studio. He paid $3.98 to record the first of two double-sided demo acetates, "My Happiness" and "That's When Your Heartaches Begin".
On July 18th, 1953, truck driver [Presley's first driver's license, from 1952, (his occupation is listed as student)] Elvis Presley made his first ever recording when he paid $3.98 at the Memphis recording service singing two songs, ‘My Happiness’ and ‘That’s When Your Heartaches Begin’. The so-called vanity disc, was a gift for his mother. It would surface 37 years later [1990] as part of an RCA compilation called ‘Elvis - the Great Performances’.
Elvis' First Operator's (Driver's) License, 1952
Elvis is seated in back of the room. In the front row Ed Leek, Elvis' friend.
June 3, 1953 Elvis graduates from Humes High School.
1953
Elvis works at Parker Machinists Shop right after graduation [Elvis had a temporary job as an assembler At M. B. Parker Company for the month of July, making 90-cents an hour or $36.00 a week.]. That summer he drops by The Memphis Recording Service, home of the Sun label and makes a demo acetate of “My Happiness” and “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin” for a cost of about $4.00. (The studio came to be known as Sun Studio though never officially named that until the 1980s. For simplicity this text uses the name Sun Studio.) The studio owner isn’t in, so his assistant, Marion Keisker handles the session. Elvis wants to see what his voice sounds like on a record and he has aspirations to become a professional singer. He takes the acetate home, and reportedly gives it to his mother as a much-belated extra birthday present. By the fall, he is working at Precision Tool Company [September 21, 1953 to March 19, 1954-Elvis worked at Precision Tool company, operating a drill press for $1.55 a hour], and soon changes jobs again, going to work for Crown Electric Company, until mid-October 1954. At Crown, he does various jobs, including driving a delivery truck. He also goes to night school and studies to be an electrician.
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Made in 1953 at Sun Records, the Memphis studio operated by Sam Phillips, it was the first song that Presley, then 18, ever recorded.
Paying $4 for the session, it is said that Presley then left the studios and went to the home of friend Ed Leek to listen to it - as his own family did not have a record player - and left the record behind. My Happiness was offered to the auction house by Leek’s niece, who inherited the record.
The origins of the recording, which has appeared on several compilations, are the subject of debate. One oft-disputed story claims that Presley recorded the disc as a present for his mother; but the singer ended up giving the item to his friend Ed Leek, who claimed to have given Presley four dollars to pay for the session.
While the recording itself has been long-known to Presley fans, since it has appeared on numerous compilations, its origins remain the subject of debate. As previously reported, Presley’s friend Ed Leek claimed to have given the singer four dollars to fund the session, subsequently inheriting the disc when Presley – whose family didn’t have a record player – left it behind at his home. Another story suggests the rock legend intended to give the recording to his mother as a gift. “My Happiness” – which was previously estimated at $500,000 by Record Collector magazine – was inherited by Leek’s niece, who put it on the auction block. Bidding started at $50,000, and the item was sold to an undisclosed buyer.
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Presley's first recording - an acetate disc, of which only a single copy exists, with “My Happiness” on one side and “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin,” on the other. Presley paid $4 to record the two songs at the Memphis Recording Service, a studio run by Sun Records, on July 18, 1953. The performances are familiar: RCA included them in several compilations. But the disc itself has always remained in private hands.
The official story was that Presley made the recording as a present for his mother. But biographers have proposed other theories, partly because the Presleys did not own a record player, and also because he left the disc with a friend, Ed Leek, who later said that he had given Presley the money for the session. One theory is that Presley simply wanted to hear how his voice sounded on record. Another is that he hoped to catch the attention of Sam Phillips, the owner of the studio and the Sun label. Phillips signed Presley to Sun in 1954.
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Jun 10, 2010
Ed Leek had died: Elvis' Memphis school friend Ed Leek has died. According to friend Maurice Colgan, Ed Leek had been valiantly fighting cancer for two years but recently was feeling more positive and cheerful.
Back in July 1953 Elvis cut his first acetate combining "My Happiness" with "That's When Your Heartaches Begin". Elvis was very excited by his new record and after playing to his parents he then played it to his school friend Ed Leek with whom it remained until its `rediscovery' in 1988. It was licensed by RCA for inclusion in its new fifties box-set.
In a recent Humes High Class of 1953 interview Ed Leek explained..
"I gave Elvis $4.00 to make his first Dub at Sam Phillip's Sun Records. It took him two months to get up the courage to do it. Elvis was very unsure of himself in the early days of his career. I had a good time traveling, double dating, etc. with him until he went into the Army. He would call me to 'round up' the bunch opf about 16 of us in total to come to where ever he was performing. He was afraid there wouldn't be anyone there if we didn't come.
He is still the only singer I listen to. I own the original Acetate along with the music rights to it. I have allowed RCA and Disney to publish the music so the fans can hear the two songs, which I feel are very good. The record has all the elements that later developed into his personal style. I also have the first commercial disk out of the labeling machine at Plastic Products on Chelsea Ave.('That's All Right' and 'Blue Moon'), which Elvis signed for me. I have always enjoyed my souvenirs, along with my Elvis memories."
Ed Leek became a successful airline pilot Captain Edwin Leek Jnr. for TWA, & American Airlines.
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Auction Details
Item Overview
Description: Likely the most important 78 mm record ever offered, this acetate was recorded by Elvis in 1953, possibly as a gift for his mother Gladys. Elvis walked into Sam Phillips’ Memphis Recording Service (home of Sun Records) and paid the sum of $4 to record a belated birthday gift for his mother — his first ever recording. Elvis sang two songs: “My Happiness” (Side A), which is the only Elvis recording that exists of this song, and “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin” (Side B). Legend has it that Elvis’ friend Ed Leek convinced and accompanied Elvis to the recording studio that fateful day. Elvis was greeted by Marion Keisker, assistant to Sam Philips, who asked Elvis who he sounded like and Elvis responded, “I don’t sound like nobody.” Little did she know at the time that he was absolutely right. In these two songs that Elvis chose to sing, Marion heard something different, enough to note Elvis’ name and telephone number and add that he was a good ballad singer. When Elvis left the studio that day, he and Ed stopped at Ed’s parents’ house to listen to the fresh recording, as they had a modern phonograph and Elvis wanted to hear how it sounded. Elvis left his friend’s house that day without the record and this acetate is being offered directly from a descendant of Ed Leek. The acetate has a label containing the titles of each song typed on the reverse of a Sun Record label. This historical 78 acetate was the beginning of a revolution in the music industry and the start of an iconic legend. In private hands since it was created, Elvis’ first recording documents the start of a musical sensation and is being offered for the first time since Elvis walked into that studio over 60 years ago. Accompanied by a notarized affidavit of authenticity from Marion Keisker. Accompanied by a letter of authenticity from Graceland Authenticated. The acetate measures approximately 10 inches (25 cm) in diameter.
Condition Report: The acetate is in original condition and the record is playable in its raw condition. The plain labels are affixed to the vinyl with rubber cement. Each is worn with tears, and has a round indentation in the paper above a hole in the acetate-coated metal center section.
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Recorded by an 18-year-old Presley on July 18th, 1953 at Sam Phillips’ Memphis Recording Service for $3.98, the one-copy-only pressing was given to Elvis’ friend Ed Leek; over 60 years later [2015], it was Leek’s daughter who auctioned off the recording, which Jack White secretly purchased.
An 18-year-old Elvis Presley walked through the doors of the Memphis Recording Service at 708 Union Ave. in the summer of 1953. He carried a beat-up guitar that he'd had since the age of 11 and enough money to make a $3.98 record of his own voice.
He sang two '30s ballads -- "My Happiness" and "That's When Your Heartaches Begin" -- hoping to catch the attention of Sam Phillips, who had started his own label, Sun. When he was done, Marion Keisker, who helped run the place with Phillips, typed his name on the back of a label for Sun act The Prisonaires, and Presley left with his acetate.
For more than six decades, that record of Elvis singing "My Happiness" was kept by the family of the high-school friend Presley left it with, Ed Leek. As part of an auction at Graceland on Jan. 8 -- which would have been Presley's 80th birthday -- it was valued at approximately $100,000. It sold to an unknown Internet bidder for $300,000.
That bidder was Jack White.
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Elvis Presley and Sun Records
The story of Elvis Presley's discovery begins with a shy, 18-year-old Elvis entering a recording studio in 1953 to cut two songs on an acetate disk at a cost of four dollars. The Memphis Recording Service was owned and operated by Sam Phillips, who had been recording rhythm-and-blues artists since 1950. By the time Elvis came to the recording studio, Sam Phillips was known as Memphis' most important independent record producer. He had opened Sun Records in 1952 to record both rhythm-and-blues (R&B) singers and country-western artists.
Phillips enjoyed a national reputation for discovering such talented R&B artists as Rufus Thomas and Junior Parker. Phillips recorded these performers for independent record companies in other parts of the United States, including Chess Records in Chicago and the Modern label in Los Angeles. Phillips financed the recording sessions, paid the musicians, recorded the artists himself (often serving as the studio engineer), and then leased the master recordings to other record companies. His reputation was built on his recordings of blues performers, but he had just begun to work with country singers when Elvis walked into his recording studio for the first time.
Unfortunately, on the day that Elvis decided to stop by, Phillips was not there. His tireless secretary and assistant, Marion Keisker, was running the recording studio alone. She noticed Elvis' flamboyant clothes and his long, slicked-back hair and engaged him in conversation. Marion asked Elvis what kind of music he sang and who he sang like. His prophetic answer, 'I don't sound like nobody', piqued her curiosity, and while Elvis was singing 'My Happiness' by the Ink Spots for his acetate record, Keisker also taped him so Phillips could hear him later. Elvis' second song for the flip side of the acetate was another Ink Spots song, 'That's When Your Heartaches Begin'. The recording cost Elvis $3.98.
He made a strong impression on Marion Keisker, a long-time Memphis radio personality who helped Sam Philips run his recording business at 706 Union.
There is little question that he stepped through the doorway at 706 Union with the idea, if not of stardom ... at the very least of being discovered. In later years he would always say that he wanted to make a personal record 'to surprise my mother' or 'I just wanted to hear what I sounded like'. But if he had simply wanted to record his voice, he could have paid twenty-five cents a TW.T. Grant's on Main Street ... Instead, Elvis went to a professional facility, where a man who had ben written up in the papers would hear him sing. Elvis dropped by 706 Union a number of times after that initial meeting to ask Ms. Keisker if she had heard of a band that needed a singer. In January 1954, he paid for a second personal record at the Memphis Recording Service.
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September, 1953, Elvis Presley went with his cousin, Gene Smith, to the 1953 Mid-South Fair.
September 21, 1953 to March 19, 1954 - Elvis worked at Precision Tool company
