Dutch reporter John Schoorl talks Elvis in "Volkskrant"

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At Elvis: today in Volkskrantmagazine

Volkskrant reporter John Schoorl went on a crusade to Elvis and never came so close. It was certainly not the first time that Volkskrant editor and Elvis adept Schoorl drew to Graceland. But so close to the King he did not come before. Today you can read his report in a new Volkskrant magazine. Below you can read the full text beforehand.

I'm lying in a king bed, 200 meters from Elvis's tomb, and lubricated myself with limonous scented Graceland bodylotion. I have also thought of setting up a Graceland shower chart while watching The King from a big screen, here in Room 482 of the Guest House at Graceland on the Elvis Presley Boulevard in Memphis, Tennessee.

Through the window, the white fence can be seen around Elvis' former rock-n-roll headquarters - adjacent to this huge hotel - as well as the extensive greenery: Elvis's trees and shrubs. There is now no one at 2 o'clock at night, either in his former service house, where he resided from 1957 until his death on August 16, 1977. The silence of Elvis, how would that sound, in such a night.

The Big E

I've been to The Big E for quite a while, and I've been to Graceland twice, but stay so close to the hip atomic nucleus, it did not come sooner. From the first time, I remember meeting Vester Presley, the uncle Tobacco uncle, who tried to bring his Presley Family Cookbook to the man.

During the audiences that followed years later, I resolved to ask my future at the Graceland stairs, in my light blue western shirt, now present.

Already in the plane on the way to America, she said dryly, stirring in her gin-tonic: "All right, but you're not going to marry me on Graceland's stairs, right?"

"Are you mad, how are you?" I screamed, sheepish.

In addition, memorable: that year, the camper took place at the Graceland RV Park & Campground, in the Love Me Tender Lane, where the sewage spontaneously raised a bolus.

As a prominent side dish of this Great Elvis Trip, I have a hard appointment with Dean Nichopoulos. That's a sap of Dr. Nick, the Greek immigrant son who elvised Elvis for several years with several pills. Dean knows Elvis technical of mittens, because he was at Graceland with his father at a young age. There he competed with Elvis in the racquetball, with the insidious mission to keep him in his last dark years.

In the highly readable autobiography (2010) by George Constantine Nichopoulos, such as Dr. Nick is completely hot, saying that the physician had at his earliest consultation with The King a case of saddle pains, and therefore had to check Elvis's royal ass.

With a bad press, due to his poor medical guidance from Elvis, Dr. Nick last year's lead. Son Dean is now a 61-year-old car buyer. He pretends to phone Elvis very close by, and may call himself a former member of the fast boy's son of The Elvis Mafia. He is looking forward to meeting, I only have to call, and he hurries quickly in his car of the case.

After meeting with Priscilla (ex-queen), Scotty Moore (ex-guitarist) DJ Fontana (ex-drummer) and Pim Maas (ex-Dutch Elvis) Dean is no superior partner. But as a scribble in music history, he seems extremely useful, so many witnesses are no longer in living condition.

The house of Elvis 

As you enter the mansion, past the lions, the stairs, and the doorbell, everything that precedes it - flash - is unnecessary with a royal lightning flash. Then, the newly opened Graceland entertainment complex across the Elvis Presley Boulevard does not exist, where Elvis is operated in all its capacities. Or do you forget the Guest House at Graceland (450 rooms), yet a loose resort, with chairs in the lobby grafted on Elvis's shiny white superman suits.

Then you do not even have to think of the bakery baker of this freshly baked Elvis property, a New Jersey guest named Joel Weinshanker. With his corporate hips, Authentic Brands Group wants to shake his moneymaker.

Here in Elvis's house - still the property of the daughter and ex of The King - you can only walk around without a walk, along Elvis. Everything is touched, nothing is cruel, and there are no devils disguised bagpipes. Here is the majeur of Elvis decorated billiards room. The many TVs of Elvis, on which he has shot. The kitchen with high-grade carpet. The Elvis Stopwatch, with real stops.

Old fan

The Elvis staircase, up and down. Really higher, like the bathroom on the top floor where he was found dead at the age of 42, is prohibited territory.

When I look into the Jungle Room with Elvis's Toy Panda and Guitar, and the exorbitant exotic device tries to capture me a little, it sounds like a series of deep deep sighs. They announce the arrival of a special, big-hit visitor who walks through the hallway.

Joe Shelton, 44, is then looking forward to puffing on a bench outside, overlooking the royal stables. All Elvis horses have died now, only Candy is another straight descendant of Rising Sun, his hip eyeball. Shelton is a sympathetic country singer from Indiana, and he is here for the second time. "The first time his father took me, in 1977, just after Elvis's death," he says. "Now that I'm a singer, I had to go for inspiration. You must know, I have ever begun singing his songs.

"Joe gets up and goes to Elvis's office, where a couple of Elvis old bikes hang around the corner, and an outboard. The box with original Elvis balls. Elvis's handgun. Back to the outside: Elvis - the dry grass. The racquetball hall, where Dean Elvis was sweating, and where Joe sat down again. "When I was a little mager, I've tried it sometime," he says. "But then I did not get what Elvis liked for racquetball."

In addition: a museum hallway where Elvis's Graceland house keys can be seen. His high school diploma. The wedding suit of Hem & Haar. A beautiful porcelain office dog, from Elvis. Photos of the Toof family, the owners of this estate, named after their daughter Grace. For 100,000 dollars, Elvis, his dad and his father were also living there.

And there is the Meditation Garden, with the tomb of Elvis Aaron Presley, and that of his parents, grandma, and his deceased brother, Jesse Garon Presley. On the edge a white marble cross with Jesus Christ, where - heavenly confusion - 'Presley' is written. Joe sat down for a moment of silence with his eyes closed, not just for him. Later on, his voice sounds as clear as light purified by a prism.

If I can dream of a better country

Where all my brothers walk hand in hand

Tell me why, oh why, oh why can not my dream come true

On the phone Dean's car company. No, Dean is not there, who is away for a few days with his colleague and permanent dear, Lee. SMS to Dean: "What time will we see each other?" Response: "I'm out of town for a few days, I'll talk to you soon."

The cross of Elvis

I'm walking along the Mississippi, on a Saturday night in Memphis. This city founded in 1819 was nothing but an island in a suburban rural area. Here the cotton was traded, here were the shops, the cafés and the jobs. Black and white, poor and rich, farmers and city councils went up in a mixed, urbanized rustling.

Memphis gold as the city of dreams, the sparkling lights that you saw flock in the distance, from the delta. There you had to go, with a backpack full of hope. You only had to cross the bridge and you were there. You did not know if you were going to make it there, and whether the streets were really paved with gold, but it was worth trying.

The blues marched into the city, and later the soul - and with Elvis the rock-roll in 1954. Elvis became the King here. This fat-slated farm shop built everything to lose it all again. The unrivaled fame and enormous wealth became an unbearable burden - Elvis's cross even after his death. Because at his death, Colonel Parker, manager of the insurance, insisted that everything would just go further, in commercial terms, that the veiled Elvis the Pelvis's veiled spirit was being sold out.

On the bottom of the Sun Studio, a few blocks away, Elvis's cross (you) is marked. Here he stood, in July 1954, during the big bang of the rock-roll. After a bit of a shame, studio leader Sam Philips demanded from the well-trained truck driver what more bluesy groaned from the lower abdomen - and Elvis opened the gas: That's All Right Mama rock-rolled out.

If you want, you can lick on the original microphone, in which the spit of 63 years of music history has accumulated.

Youth friend

Elvis's old youth friend humt and has a wobbly right leg. Guy Harris is in a hall just behind the moving picturesque home of His High Heavy Highness in Tupelo, Mississippi. The mother of the old youth friend was witness to Elvis's birth, he says. Gladys Presley was still lying on bed, while it was just found that her son had died. She said, "I have such a strange feeling in my stomach, get the doctor." "And then Elvis, Gladys did not know she was wearing twins," says Guy (78). "Elvis became my friend, and on Sunday we sang together in the church choir in the church. I'm very well aware that he had received a guitar, and that she sang on the porch Old Shep. "

On the hill, behind the birthplace, Elvis is in bronze, his arms spread, depicted as an angel.

In downtown Tupelo, past a statue of a rocking Elvis, you can starve at the bottom of an iron warehouse to Elvis's cross. The recalcitrant snoodaard wanted a handgun at the age of 11, but in the marked place his mother bought a guitar - the unwanted gift.

On November 6, 1948, father and mother presley resigned with the 13-year-old Elvis in their old green Plymouth to Memphis to flee the poverty in Tupelo, a journey of just two hours - but a world of difference.

"No," the lady of the car says on the phone, "Dean is still not." "Dean, does it work?" I sms.

It's Now or Never

I'm in Earnestine and Hazel's crazy ridge, somewhere in Memphis, with a Ghost River beer (red label) in my hand. In the ladies' wc of this turbulent restaurant there are bullet holes, and those greasy hammocks in the hallway were not finished long ago. Downstairs, a southern combo plays the soul burgers of the baking sheet, and above is Jesse Smith, a slender man with pendulous shoulders blowing himself on his scissors. Accompanied by a torn tune recorder, My Funny Valentine's playful version comes true - and Elvis looks okay on the wall, here's someone in his mind to squeeze everything out. Dean gets the jar up. It's Now or Never, Elvis said. Oh, in the inner pocket of my leather jacket I have a piece of wood, something bigger than a heart valve. It is derived from a Northern Catalpa (Catalpa speciosa), also called the trumpet tree, which flourishes in July. On Graceland.

Photo: Elvis' youth friend Guy Harris

Published: April 29, 2017, 09:11
Source: De Volkskrant / ElvisMatters / Published by: ElvisMatters - Jeroen Vanderschoot.