It is difficult to be enthusiastic about all aspects of Elvis Presley's music. And it is easy to see him as a hip-swivelling product of hype and advertising. All that obscures his greatness as a singer. So this webpage is dedicated to the "unappreciated" Elvis Presley.

Of course, part of singing is having a good-sounding voice, a large range, and being able to sing loud. Elvis had these, though I suspect we could find better singers by these standards alone. I am interested in the things Elvis could do with his voice, and the things he did.

The Four Go's in "Blue Suede Shoes"

Athleticism

One Presley trademark is the "hiccups" or "stuttering". These are moments of silence breaking a note into parts. I can do these, but they are cumbersome and sound like the bad singing that they are. The young Presley could do them quickly and apparently effortlessly. One web page suggested that they served to degrade the lyrics. I think the obvious effect is positive, to make the vocal part more rhythmic.

Falsetto Flashes. Presley could do a flash of falsetto so short you can hardlly know it's there. To be more precise, it probably depends on your listening skills -- if you are used to listening to them, you can hear them; if you are not used to listening to them, they are difficult to hear, except you know that something happened.

I cannot come close to the brevity of Presley's falsetto flashes. When I try, it sounds "Hill Billy". I assume that this is why some people have described Presley as singing in a hill billy style. Falsetto flashes at the end of a note have been called feathering, and that has been described as a part of hill billy, but Presley puts them at the start of notes too.