Did You Know Elvis Presley Was A Music Thief? 10 Times The “King of Rock & Roll” Stole From Black Artists

Thanks for that history lesson. I had no idea.

This article is very poorly researched and is overwhelmingly inaccurate. Big Mama Thornton was given Hound Dog to *sing by the two White, Jewish men (Lieber & Stoller) who wrote it and offered her a writing credit and $500 to *sing it in 1952, but someone messed up the publishing and nobody got credited for four years. Fast forward to 1956, between 6-10 covers had already been made of Lieber & Stoller’s hit song, BMT’s blues version sold 500,000 copies and spent I think 8 weeks at #1 on the “race charts” (then changed to R&B charts by billboard in the US). Then Elvis saw Freddie Bell & The Bellboy’s sing a faster, rockier version in Las Vegas and wanted to cover it. Nobody minded the other covers of “Big Mama’s song” (although she didn’t write any of it). Then Elvis recorded it and it sold 10M copies, finally Lieber & Stoller got paid a nice fat cheque becasue it is the songwriter’s that get paid royalties, not the person who *sings it. They decided they liked their millions and didn’t give BMT a credit and as I have researched, never gave her another penny. They shafted her, not Elvis. “Hound Dog” co-writer Mike Stoller has refuted claims that Elvis Presley ’s version of the classic rock’n’roll song was stolen from Big Mama Thornton.” She didn’t write it and claimed Elvis stole her song. It’s sad, but she was misguided rather than lying. In any case, the songwriter’s only got paid because Elvis covered The Bellboy’s version, slightly different words and not aimed at a man.

Next, Elvis recorded approximately 761 songs in his lifetime, above you named only ten specifics. I’d argue there could be upto 40 but I can’t name them all here. Overall that is min 1% to 4% of his songs were “stolen” but what you really mean is *covered, which happens everyday with all artists. And artists, Black & White cover songs everyday and nothing is made of it. Just so happens some people have got a severe hatred which is amplified by Chuck D’s lie on his track where he admitted scapegoating Elvis (I think he was right about John Wayne), and later had to admit he had to sell records so he used a big name, Elvis. Crappy thing to do, and he’s lost a mountain of respect and credibility but he sold his records off the back of a dead man.

Quincey Jones was also a liar. What actually happened is that he wanted to play trumpet on Elvis’s Dorsey Bros show and Elvis said he didn’t need one. That’s all. There is no documented proof that Elvis ever said any more to QJ and all of the Black legends and colleagues all said the same, Elvis wasn’t like that with Black people. He was one of the only big stars of his time openly crediting Black artists and Black music and publicly showing respect to them. See the WDIA fundraiser events he attended two years in a row where he sneaked backstage to support his friend BB King who was a DJ on the radio station at the time, as was Rufus Thomas. He was photographed there with Junior Parker, Bill Ward, BB, Carla Thomas met him there. This is all checkable info if you get a copy of Beale Black and Blue, Mckee & Chisenhall. The interviews of Nat D Williams, Robert Henry and others are detailed in there. They actually knew Elvis.

Roy Hamilton, beautiful man with a big baritone voice and a huge vocal idol of Elvis’. They met when they both recorded at the same time at American Sound Studios, 1969. They got on brilliantly, (Roy’s son says there are photo’s at Elvis’ house when his dad went to give Elvis vocal coaching, but others contest this. I can’t verify it for sure). Elvis was meant to record Angelica but thought Roy could sing it better (likely right, but Roy was a classically trained baritone). Anyway I never heard Elvis sing like Roy until after 1969 when his voice had grown and deepened. Elvis only sang in Roy’s style when he *covered Roy’s songs (Hurt, Unchained Melody, You’ll Never Walk Alone, and he didn’t sing You Can Have Her like Roy, live in 1977). Sadly, Roy suffered a cerebral haemorrhage and spent 7 days in hospital. Tony Orlando confirmed that he and Elvis were at his bedside at the time. The Hamilton’s confirmed Elvis covered the medical bills (as he did with Jackie Wilson), the funeral expenses and sent “royalty cheques” to Myrna Hamilton to feed the children. The cheques continued being sent by Elvis’s estate until the year 2000.

Otis Blackwell, a prolific songwriter but short, thick glasses and he didn’t look the part (unlike Roy who could’ve been a model), he too wrote for Roy and it is said that the song sounds like what Elvis “stole” although he wrote the songs. Otis was on a five year contract to write for Presley, and he went on Letterman playing up to Elvis stole… but then he was honest and said he’d never met EP, and didn’t want to jinx a good thing. he sent demo tapes in ELVIS’S STYLE because he was desperate for Elvis to record his songs (all songwriters wanted him to make them a hit record).

I found all of this out because I wanted to know the source of the accusations and to see if he really was a song thief and a lucky white boy. No, to all of those. I found the total opposite, and these quotes:

“He called me Sir and I liked that” BB King.
“You ain’t gon tell me nothing about Elvis, I know Elvis and I love him like a brother.” James Brown
“He’s my baby, you don’t tell me about Elvis Presley he did a lot for me and he’s my baby… By singin my song he made it bigger and made me bigger.” Little Richard.

In time, after Elvis died and the pay still hadn’t caught up with what Elvis made they felt the resentment of course. But none of these guys degraded Elvis’s talent. They all knew each other. Elvis was a friend to Black society and a nice guy.