The Guitar That Rocked The World

December 28, 2004

Earlier we reported that Pink Floyd's David Gilmour took part in a special concert held at London's legendary Abbey Road Studios, to record a a celebration of 50 years of rock'n'roll. With thanks to the executive producer of the whole production, Pierre Sarazin, we now have more detail on this one-off performance, that will be seeing the light of day during 2005.

Pierre said "We shot 15 days ago (2 & 3 December 2004) in High Definition in the legendary studio 1 at Abbey Road Studios a TV special around Scotty Moore, called "The Guitar That Rocked The World". Scotty Moore was the first manager of Elvis (even before the recording at Sun of "That's Alright Mama" in 1954) and was his guitarist from the early days until 1970 when Elvis left to Las Vegas.

"With his guitar slicks on "That's Alright Mama" and "Heartbreak Hotel" Scotty Moore is widely considered as the inventor of the sound of rock'n'roll.

"After the mythical "68 Comeback Special" on NBC (now released on DVD with a huge success in the US and around the world) Elvis was due to tour with Scotty in Europe. One knows today why Colonel Parker prevented this project.

"Scotty Moore has therefore realized, for the 70th anniversary of the birth of Elvis, in front of our cameras the dream of the King.

"During this recording session 27 titles among the biggest hits of Elvis were revisited. The best guitar players have participated to this project with Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler, David Gilmour, Bill Wyman, Ron Wood, Martin Taylor, Albert Lee...

"On this occasion Scotty Moore, Jerry Schilling (very close friend of Elvis from 1954 to 1977, manager of Graceland, member of the board of Elvis Enterprises...) gave long interviews (one and a half hours altogether). All the invited stars also replied to our questions (two hours altogether).

"The exclusive photos of this event were taken by Jean-Marie Périer. His last visit to Abbey Road was in 1966 when he was the official photographer of The Beatles for the Sergeant Pepper's sessions!

"The sound was recorded by Patrice Cramer in 48 tracks in the legendary control room of Abbey Road Studios. The TV special in HD (high definition), which lasts 90 minutes, mixes these exclusive interviews together with the songs of the King performed by the best English musicians. In the programme David Gilmour performs "Don't".

"The team that realized this programme is composed of:

Director: Massimo Manganaro
Light director and designer: Jean-Pierre Joubert
Sound: Patrice Cramer
Exec Producer: Pierre Sarazin
API Productions / MH4 GmbH / All Stars Inc production.
The DVD rights for the world are held by TF1 video, and the DVD and CD will be released during the second quarter of 2005."

Source:

Brain Damage

Carl wrote on December 28, 2004

People like Scotty Moore and Carl Perkins never really get their due and recognition in creating the guitar sound in rock and roll. Scotty Moore had a lot to do with creating the guitar sound that everybody else emulated and copied. But he never gets the recognition that BLACK artists get in a kind of reverse discrimination. Scotty Moore was definitely the first the create a guitar sound for rock and roll. Only Bill Haley's Holiday/Essex releases could compare with Moore's influence. People also dis Bill Black as a bass player but he was very infleuntial in creating the bass sound for rock. Again, probably only Marshall Lytle of the Comets could compare to him in rock influence. And Elvis still gets dissed for his guitar playing. The "experts" say he used the guitar merely as a prop. But Elvis did play spectacular LEAD guitar on the no. 1 hits ONE NIGHT and BLUE CHRISTMAS. Elvis liked to play the bassy A string a lot but that was his style. He had a distinctive lead guitar style. What these "experts" don't know is that all lead guitarists play the same licks over and over again, it is called "Signature" licks, etc. And Elvis played that great opening riff on That's All Right that really drives the record forward. It is great to see Scotty Moore get the recognition he deserves. Without any question, his lead guitar solos on That's All Right and Heartbreak Hotel are probably the most famous in all of rock history. Everybody knows those.

MauriceColgan wrote on January 26, 2005

Thanks Carl. An intelligent observation to be repeated! Scotty kindly agreed to meet my wife Maureen and I after a Concert in The Village, Night Club Dublin last year. Lovely man! We exchanged just a few sentences as he was a little exhausted. It was a great Concert the Band was excellent and Scotty played beautifully. He was still recovering from his Surgical Operation and a hectic Concert schedule. Yes indeed, Scotty deserves far more respect for his part in the birth of Rock n Roll and the subsequent momentous events as Elvis stormed the world! The truth will be told.