Elvis plays a uke

GinnyT11

GinnyT11

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I was flipping through channels and happened across a few minutes of "It Happened at the World's Fair," with Elvis in Seattle in 1962. In this scene he plays a little girl's uke. There are immediately backing guitars, but he's playing the uke. In the full scene, the child strikes the final chord.

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Nice Find Ginny.....thank you for sharing...don't remember that movie...thought I saw them all too...
 
Thank you so much for sharing this!
It looks like he is playing a 1950´s Harmony Concert.

180U-1101_front.jpg
 
Thanks. That was great.
 
Happy Birthday Mr. E...
You are missed.
Now all we got is Justin Beiber and Taylor Swift, seriously.
 
gaspar said:
Thank you so much for sharing this!
It looks like he is playing a 1950´s Harmony Concert.
Click to expand...

Nice photo, Gaspar. The Seattle World's Fair occurred in 1962 (that's when they built the Space Needle and monorail---we were all so space-loving then), so the uke would have had to be dated prior to that. It looks new in the movie.

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I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he's not really playing in that scene.
 
We *just* recorded that movie on our DVR and are going to watch it soon, I will look for that scene! We saw on TCM that Kurt Russel is the little boy that kicks him in the shin at the fair, then Kurt went on to portray Elvis (and very well, I might add) in the 1979 movie about Elvis.
 
Captain Simian said:
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say he's not really playing in that scene.
Click to expand...

I'm going to go out on what I consider to be even less of a limb and say that he's not actually singing in that scene either. Back then they overdubbed music, especially in scenes filmed outdoors where there'd be a lot of ambient noise (truck engine, tires on the road), none of which you can hear in that clip. Elvis was a guitarist, and it's possible that he knew how to play the ukulele; it's also possible he's making guitar chords with his fretting hand. I bet someone else is playing the ukulele in the recording they dubbed into the movie, because when they were making that recording Elvis was probably busy singing. Still, a scene in which Elvis appears to be playing the ukulele is an endorsement of the ukulele by Elvis, which is cool.
 
mds725 said:
I'm going to go out on what I consider to be even less of a limb and say that he's not actually singing in that scene either. Back then they overdubbed music, especially in scenes filmed outdoors where there'd be a lot of ambient noise (truck engine, tires on the road), none of which you can hear in that clip.
Click to expand...

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that they're not actually outdoors. The background was shot by a B team in western Washington (in the movie segment, you can clearly see Mt. Rainier), and they played it behind the truck, which is being vibrated from below. The light is unchanged and there's no wind, so they could record it many times, long into the night if needed. And they still overdub music in films.

I think Elvis is playing in the scene because he's clearly making chords, but you're hearing a studio recording of several instruments.
 
GT3T11 said:
I'm going to go out on a limb and say that they're not actually outdoors. The background was shot by a B team in western Washington (in the movie segment, you can clearly see Mt. Rainier), and they played it behind the truck, which is being vibrated from below. The light is unchanged and there's no wind, so they could record it many times, long into the night if needed. And they still overdub music in films.

I think Elvis is playing in the scene because he's clearly making chords, but you're hearing a studio recording of several instruments.
Click to expand...

Good point about the scene being shot indoors. I noticed that Elvis was making chords, but I didn't hear a correlation between them and the ukulele that one can hear in the song. There's a point near the end of the video where Elvis goes up the neck a bit, but the ukulele music, from what I could hear, doesn't seem to.

Regardless of the technology, I have no doubt that Elvis, who was a proficient guitarist, could play the ukulele. And I wonder if the ukulele's appearance in that movie boosted ukulele popularity when the movie came out.
 
I'll go out on a limb and say that wasn't really a little girl, but Jim Morrison in a little girl costume and makeup..
 
mds725 said:
Good point about the scene being shot indoors. I noticed that Elvis was making chords, but I didn't hear a correlation between them and the ukulele that one can hear in the song. There's a point near the end of the video where Elvis goes up the neck a bit, but the ukulele music, from what I could hear, doesn't seem to.

Regardless of the technology, I have no doubt that Elvis, who was a proficient guitarist, could play the ukulele. And I wonder if the ukulele's appearance in that movie boosted ukulele popularity when the movie came out.
Click to expand...

His fretting looked pretty consistent with the changes to me, as did his strumming. There are a few times when the music does a glissando up the neck, and he does it right along every time. I agree that he is syncing to a dubbed track -- SOP, but it looks to me like he could play.
 
Although I couldn't find anything on YouTube, I imagine Elvis got some exposure to the ukulele when he was making those Hawaii movies.

Not to hijack the thread, but here's another Elvis playing an ukulele.

 
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