It All Started In Memphis

Rock n' Roll, I mean

Sun Records is a Memphis icon. Marsha and I happened to be in the neighborhood last fall, so we stopped in and took the tour.  

Sam Phillips had been recording black artists who had little opportunity to cut records back in the fifties. He recorded artists like B.B. King. And The Prisonaires got out long enough to cut "Just Walkin' in the Rain" in 1953. It soon became a hit for Johnnie Ray. But everyone in town knew its origins, so a young man right out of high school showed up and paid $4 to record a "personal" one-of-a-kind record to give his mother. He obviously hoped Sam would like his version of "My Happiness." But Sam hated ballads.  

Recognize the piano and the acoustic tile?

 He eventually did let the kid named Elvis back in to see what else he could do. That session ran into the night, but Sam didn't like anything he heard. As they were quitting, Elvis started clowning around, singing the Blues song "That's All Right" to a much speeded up tempo. Bingo!

Our tour guide showed us the collection of hits

  









Sam made the studio musicians learn it and cut a record right then. The rest is history. Sam soon had a stable of singers: Elvis, Carl Perkins (Blue Suede Shoes) and Johnny Cash. They and Jerry Lee Lewis, who started as Sam's studio piano player, became known as "The Million Dollar Quartet."

At the end of the tour they let us hold the original Shure microphone
that Sam used to record Elvis, Johnny, Carl, Jerry Lee and the others.
Our guide pointed out that all these stars had slobbered and spit on it.
I did a bit of social distancing.

A local DJ, also named Phillips, got the disk
at 7 am and started playing it on the radio.  He
got so many calls asking that he play it again
that he played it non-stop all morning.  That's
all right, Momma, indeed.

After them came Roy Orbison, Charley Rich and others. The studio at 706 Union Ave., is mostly a tourist destination now, but they still record there after the tours end for the day.