If I Can Dream, the Story of "Being Elvis" for 50 Years

Introduction

What if.....? What if Elvis didn't die at age 42? What if the late rocker didn't gorge himself on cheeseburgers and opiates? What if he grew old gracefully and ended up performing the music he loved for the audiences he loved at… say, a theatre in Branson, MO? What if instead of looking bleary eyed at one of his Vegas backup band members, he now beamed with pride at his 6 year old granddaughter who now wowed the audience with her vocal abilities during the show? What if, instead of stumbling across the stage in a sad parody of himself, he still moved with the pulsating rhythm of the music he made famous, a beat now driven by his two grandsons playing their hearts’ out on the drums as they watch their rock n’ roll granddad? What if there was a happy ending to one of the greatest fairy tales of all time? This happy ending is a reality. Not for Elvis Presley, but for a man who has performed as The King since 1965, over a decade before Elvis died... As one TV interviewer recently put it, You've been Elvis longer than Elvis was Elvis! Now, after nearly 50 years of singing to audiences from Vegas to D.C. and from Cancun to Canada with his portrayal of TV Guide's Artist of the Century, this Elvis Tribute performer has decided to tell his story. The first performer to be inducted into the Worldwide Elvis Performer's Hall of Fame has traveled a long and winding road (pardon the Beatles reference) from a couple shows a month in his home town of Waukegan, IL to 200 shows a year at Branson, MO’s very first theatre. His story takes us from a child who sang into a make believe microphone (a hairbrush) at age 4 to a featured performer in Las Vegas. A story filled with humor, sadness, and even a little joy as this singer of songs experiences insecurity, rejection, lost love and finally acceptance and even adulation as a make believe icon. Of the thousands of books written about Elvis and Elvis Impersonators, no one has written from the King’s perspective. Not even Elvis Presley himself wrote any memoirs. Astonishing, that one who would tell so many musical stories in his career, didn’t give any insight as to how he saw the world. His ability to interpret a lyric would have proved invaluable to tell his story. Too bad, that we’re left with only the views of mean spirited critics like Albert Goldmann, (who also besmirched John Lennon in another nauseating Clifford Irving style literary lie) or hangers-on who, on one hand claiming deep friendship with Presley yet not lifting a finger to save his life when he needed them most. Or, worse still the Fanatics who would just as soon worship him in some Church of Elvis (an actual institution!) using his sweat

as holy water. Now, at last, a different view. Not a view from the top, but a view from a kindred spirit. A comment on the force that molded Elvis into the performer he ultimately became—a love of the music. A love shared by a lowly Elvis Impersonator .

This isn't your everyday, run of the mill Elvis Impersonator. This is a guy who, as a sophomore in high school, won first place in a statewide One Act Play Festival with his original play condemning racial prejudice during the turbulent 60's. This is a published poet who scored highly on the Mensa exam. He could have been anything, so his wife says. So why Elvis? This inside view of the Elvis Impersonator Phenomenon attempts to answer that question in a most entertaining and insightful way.

The most difficult thing for a person to accept is his or her own mediocrity. The hope that one might be special in some way is the driving force behind any display of ambition. In fact, the fear that the opposite is true is what frightens many people from reaching out in business, relationships or life itself. Those few who are viewed by the world as special have one thing in common. They fear that someday the world will find out that they’re not special at all but just as average as the next person. That’s why they go to great lengths to delay that revelation as long as possible. Through the use of smoke screens, distractions and illusions, they hold on to the fleeting, fading wisp of being …special.

There are those however, who make a point of being nondescript. Some cultures discourage the Western world’s flair for the conspicuous. To be lost in a sea of similarity is a national practice for many in the Far East. Are they truly satisfied even smugly proud of their uniformity? The older generation seems so, however, their children don’t seem so attached to the ancient creeds of self-denial and monastic restraint. The truth is most people are afraid of being lost in the mix. Especially, those who deny it. The underlying factors behind such denials are usually shyness, feelings of inferiority or both. People are always coming up with new ways to let their light shine. When faced with failure in one area, one can always discover new and different ways to excel. Opportunities to make one’s mark in this world are aplenty. Academia, the business world, the arts, the law, religion, philosophy, science, technology, economics… the list is virtually inexhaustible. After pondering each of them, I made my choice.

My name is Dave. I’m an Elvis Impersonator.

For those of you still with me, I just thought I get that out of the way. You would have found out sooner or later anyway. Perhaps the photo of the author on the back of this book featuring sideburns might have given it away. Now that it’s out in the open, the question is: Can you put aside all the clichés about my profession and read this with an open mind, accepting this writing as an insightful reflection by a member of the Brotherhood of Man? I didn’t think so. But for those who like a good story, read on….

What drives an otherwise average baby boomer to end up in a back stage dressing room surrounded by bottles of hairspray, (an obvious improvement over the cans of hairspray in vogue when I first started in the 60’s), high-collared jumpsuits, and Brut cologne? Now, just before show time, with the instrumental version of Love Me Tender caressing the waiting audience, I will try to explain. And, considering the wide-eyed expression on my grandson’s face as he announces, Showtime, Grandpa! I’m sure it won’t be the last time I tell this story

Chapter One: Waukegan, IL – 1955

David! My mother gasped, Where HAVE you been! She was obviously frantic after searching for her oldest son for over an hour. At four years old, I wasn’t exactly free to come and go as I pleased. The two young girls who accompanied me to my front door explained. He said he was going to school. We knew the nearest school was about 5 miles away over in the next town so we thought we better bring him on home." I had recalled seeing a school in that direction while riding in the car with my parents and decided to simply, go to school. After all, I had equipped myself with two of the thickest volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica I could find and set off to further my education. I suppose when one hasn’t yet started his education, any effort in that direction could be construed as furthering it.

My mother took the opportunity to further my education in a different, rather corporal way actually. With a mixture of motherly panic over a missing child and a stifled chuckle over the sight of a child carrying books larger than himself, she mustered up a halfhearted swat on my seat of intelligence. Still, I felt this warm glow, not from the abbreviated spanking, but a sensation of being…noticed.

Noticed by the two girls who from across a busy street noticed me enough to cross traffic to rescue me a lost child. Why, at the age of four, I had stumbled onto a tactic that full grown men use with great success. Many a guy has acted totally lost in a grocery store so that he could be rescued by a pretty female shopper. Sad to say, even though I got an early start, I failed to perfect this tactic. Although it marked a first attempt at going off on my own. It also marked the last time two things happened in my life. It was the last time two girls took ME home. And, it was the last time I can remember having no fear.

Chapter Two: Zion, IL - 1965

Fear…... paralyzing, heart-stopping fear. The kind that reluctantly allowed my next breath to be gasped to fill my deflated lungs. The kind that transformed my carefully applied theatrical sideburns into rivulets of black macabre facial art that would have made Alice Cooper jealous. That’s pretty much what I remember about my first performance as Elvis in 1965. My leg had a natural twitch like the one made famous by the late rocker but mine was of the more uncontrollable kind driven by terror rather than rhythm. When I started to sing, the voice that had only hours before sounded similar to a young Elvis, now had the melodic tone of a rusty hinge. Lyrics that had shortly before come with ease now had to be pried from my frozen jaws clenched as though in dire need of a tetanus shot.

My expensive bronzing stage make-up did little to conceal the brilliant red glow of my cheeks which now glowed with the heat of charcoal on a backyard grill. The admiring gazes of the females in the audiences were now distorted in disbelief at what they were previously anticipating. Some of the white girls in the audience seemed to actually nod their heads to an uneven spastic Caucasian beat. My three minute assassination of one of the King’s ballads seemed to last hours.

When it was over, I couldn’t wait for the next chance to do it again. As this 3 minute shot occurred a dozen years prior to the King’s demise it was looked upon as a novelty rather than the second coming phenomenon I would experience in the late 70’s when the world was still in Rock n’ Roll Mourning. Two older girls in the audience proudly smiled and pointed in my direction as if to say, We rescued him once when he was a little boy.

Chapter Three: Waukegan, IL – May 8, 1951 – Victory Memorial Hospital

O.K., so the rescue girls weren’t really there. I should point out that like Mark Twain, I have never felt bound by the facts when telling a story. This is especially true in my accounts of experiences with the opposite sex. For example,

My first romantic affair occurred early in life.. I was one day old in the nursery when I noticed a cute little number in the crib next to mine.

Hey, I said. What’s your name?

Ava said the cutie.

You’re kind of cute, probably hot too, but I’m too young to know that for sure. But honestly, you are definitely the prettiest girl I’ve ever met. My eyes are still focusing but….

Hey, said the probably hot newborn, I wasn’t born yesterday…..I was born the day before yesterday!

That’s great! I love older women. In fact, there were no younger women. Ava, I got serious now, I know we haven’t known each other very long. But I feel like we connected. You wanna go steady?

And just how are we going to do that? I don’t suppose you have a ring on you, she asked. (I really hate it when women get all logical on you.)

I know, I was reaching now I heard one of the nurses say my eyes twinkled. How about if I give you the twinkle from my right eye? Somehow, I knew even as an infant that girls liked sparkle Then, I continued, When we meet again, I’ll know it’s you. She went for it. Even though our romance was in its infancy I was in it for the long run, probably forever... Or, until her folks took her home.

Chapter Four: North Chicago, IL 1956

I finally did attend the school I had set out for on that little boy lost day. A little over a year later my parents moved to a little house less than two blocks from my very first school. An official Student- at last! Granted as a kindergartner, I was definitely an underclassman but a student nonetheless. It’s funny though, the only female attention I remember receiving was from my teacher, Mrs. Young. I still remember feeling almost weightless, engulfed in her perfume as she hugged me every morning as I raced into the classroom. Elvis was wooing the girls on the radio with his new Heartbreak Hotel but I was oblivious and not at all ready to assume my Elvis Impersonator role just yet. Getting an education thing foremost on my mind, sort of…..

Between my morning greeting from Mrs. Young and the sing a long sessions, I was having a ball. I was so taken by my first teacher, I wanted to buy her something. (Why do guys do that?) So, I marched right up to the counter at the neighborhood store and picked out the most spectacular gift I could think of…a box of Good & Plenty candy! I put my money right up there on the counter, grabbed the box of candy and headed out the door to deliver my token of affection. That’s when the trouble started. It seems I wasn’t yet familiar with the currency exchange rate in that locale. Apparently Monopoly money had no exchange rate! The storekeeper nabbed me on the spot, called my mother and I was branded a felon, all in the name of Love!

Chapter Five: Las Vegas, NV - 1979 - 18 months after Elvis died

Love was the commodity used as legal tender in Las Vegas in 1979 when I first performed in the city known as Lounge Lizard Heaven. My manager, Karl was proudly shuttling his new property, Dave Elvis between two performance venues on the strip. Since the clubs were in close proximity and he never missed an opportunity to grandstand, we walked from one gig to the other.

Trying to be a man of the world and yet totally blinded by the Vegas glitz, I was also reeling from all the attention that even an ersatz Elvis received in Sin City. So that when a female voice