Diane Thomas
The Year the Music Changed
The Year the Music Changed - Italian translation
The Year the Music Changed - Japanese translation
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THE YEAR THE MUSIC CHANGEDSYNOPSIS, from the book jacket
It is 1955, and Achsa McEachern is a lonely and precocious fourteen-year-old, isolated at school by her intelligence and disfigured face and troubled at home by the undercurrents in her parents’ marriage. She turns for comfort to her radio and to “that new music, rock and roll.” Hearing a recording by an unknown twenty-year-old singer named Elvis Presley, she fires off a fan letter, probably the first he has received, telling him he is going to be a star. Insecure in the world he is entering and burning with a desire to succeed, Elvis answers her and enlists her help in teaching him how to “talk good.” The intimate and touching year-long correspondence that follows chronicles their coming of age as artists and as individuals. Able to confide in no one else, they share their most private hopes and fears. Elvis becomes Achsa’s sounding board as she dreams of leaving the South for a Bohemian life as a poet in New York, watches her beautiful, emotionally distant mother and her sternly religious father lurch toward tragedy, confronts her own scarred mouth and faces a shattering loss and revelation. The young singer’s responses reveal his fierce, aching innocence in the year before his star bursts forth and offer a fascinating glimpse into the grassroots history of rock and roll. Set in the twilight days of the segregated South, the novel also provides small-canvas study of a nation on the brink of momentous upheaval, making 1955 truly "the year the music changed." AN EXCERPT FROM THE YEAR THE MUSIC CHANGED Introduction On August 6, 1977, just two weeks after the publication of my biography of Achsa McEachern-Isaacs and two years to the day after the tragic auto accident that took her life, an ordinary-looking package wrapped in brown paper arrived at my office. I was out of the country, so the parcel sat for three weeks on my desk. On opening it, I discovered a large, battered Hav-A-Tampa cigar box with the words “Grammer Lessons” gouged into the lid. Two wide rubber bands held it securely closed. Beneath one was tucked a small, cream-colored vellum envelope that contained the following handwritten note: Dear Dr. Gelber, I read in the papers where you wrote a book about Achsa McEachern-Isaacs. She must have meant a great deal to you for you to write about her. She meant a lot to me, too. That is why I want you to have these. I knew her when she was 14 years old. I kept them a long time. Wishing you all the best. Yours truly, Elvis Presley As Mr. Presley’s death had dominated the previous week’s news, I of course suspected a hoax. Yet the note’s wording touched me. I opened the box and found it crammed with literally dozens of letters, all apparently written to Mr. Presley by a young Achsa McEachern more than twenty years before. Creased and dog-eared, they gave off a faint odor of Old Spice, the popular aftershave of my youth. Unwilling to let excitement get the upper hand, I pocketed several of them, along with Mr. Presley’s note, and paid a visit to a handwriting expert across campus. In short order, he declared them all authentic: My cigar box contained pages and pages of revealing documentation, by the subject herself, of what must have been the most formative year of her life. Here was a teenage girl destined to emerge as a lightning rod for New York’s alternative theater movement, writing to a young country singer who, arguably, would become America’s most recognizable cultural icon—throughout the pivotal year that marked the birth of rock and roll. It was tempting to re-examine Ms. McEachern-Isaacs’ life immediately, in view of this new information. On reflection, however, I determined that before bringing this correspondence to light I would search out Mr. Presley’s letters to her, leaving no stone unturned, until I either found them or satisfied myself that they had been destroyed. Through the ensuing years, that is what I did. I accomplished other projects, of course, including a biography of actor-director Milton Isaacs, whom Achsa McEachern married in 1967. Finally, in January 2004, I received a phone call from their daughter, the singer-songwriter Jesse Isaacs Sanchez. While readying her family’s summer home in the Adirondacks for sale, she had found Mr. Presley’s letters stashed in an attic suitcase. The correspondence is, of course, most notable for what it reveals about Ms. McEachern-Isaacs, but it is not without revelations regarding Mr. Presley, as well: The young man of these letters bears no resemblance to the bloated caricature our culture has chosen to enshrine. He is instead a true naif, a country boy as yet unshaped by the wider world. Reading his letters, I had difficulty absorbing the fact that his life has become the subject of so much research that his whereabouts and activities on virtually every day of it are public record—information, incidentally, that assisted in corroborating the letters’ authenticity. Of all the documents, only one emerged as problematic. Written by Mr. Presley, it was destroyed, as described by Achsa McEachern, and then recreated by her from memory. How accurate was her recreation? For that I have no answer—only my sincere belief that, considering her stated familiarity with the original, her extreme attachment to it, and the emotionally charged circumstances surrounding its destruction, she had a powerful motivation to reproduce it word for word, and did so. One hurdle remained before the unlikely friendship between the young Achsa McEachern and Elvis Presley could become public knowledge. Considering the content of several of Achsa McEachern’s letters, I felt a moral obligation to lay out the entire correspondence for Ms. Sanchez and allow her the final determination on whether any—or all—of it should be withheld. Her courage in agreeing to its publication in toto bespeaks her deep conviction regarding the importance of the material. The result is this volume. Though slender, it is tendered in the hope that it will represent a significant addition to the extant information on these two too-brief lives. -- Aaron J. Gelber, Ph.D., Department of Theatre Arts, Westbury College, Westbury, Vermont, May 14, 2004 CHAPTER ONE: February 2 - March 30, 1955 Atlanta, Georgia, Wednesday, February 2, 1955 Dear Mr. Presley: I don't know who you are and I'm not a person who writes fan letters, but this is important. I just heard your song, "That's All Right, Mama," and it really knocked me out. The trouble is, they're playing it on the wrong radio station. I heard it on a hillbilly station. Nobody listens to hillbilly music, and I don't know why you think you're a hillbilly singer. You're not. You're singing that new music they call "rock and roll." Or "rhythm and blues," if you're a Negro, I can't tell from your voice. I can't tell if you're young or old, either. But I can tell one big thing. I know exactly what you feel with every word. I've never heard anybody sing like that before. I can pick a hit better than anyone, and "That's All Right, Mama" deserves to go all the way to number one on "Your Hit Parade" on TV. Unless something changes, however, I seriously doubt it will. I myself only heard it by accident, when I was twisting my radio dial trying to find some rock and roll. It reached out from that hillbilly station and grabbed me, and I believe every rock and roll radio show in the country ought to be playing your song. I thought you would want to know this. Yours truly, Achsa J. McEachern * * * Memphis, Tennessee, Sunday, February 6, 1955 Dear Mr. McEachern, Thank you very much for your letter. I am real glad you think That's All Right Mama deserves to be Number One on the Hit Parade Show. I do too. You sure do know a lot about music. Do you work at a radio station? You said you cant tell nothing about me from my voice here is who I am. I was born in Tupelo Mississippi on January 8, 1935. My Mamas name is Gladys. She is the light of my life. My Daddys name is Vernon. He is a good man that is had some hard times. My twin brothers name is Jesse Garon. He died getting born. We moved to Memphis when I was 13. I graduated from Humes High School. It is a white high school. I am 20 years old. If That's All Right had not started making me some money I would be a electrician by now. I was going to school for it. I got to say I did not like it much. As for me singing hillbilly, I suppose sometimes I do and sometimes I do not. I like all the music there is. Even opera. I dont never try to sing one special kind. Whatever comes out that is what it is. I really like it how you said all the rock and roll radio shows ought to be playing my record. I will take every one of your words to heart. I hope to hear from you again. If I ever get to Atlanta I sure will look you up. Yours truly, Elvis Aron Presley * * * Atlanta, Wednesday, February 16, 1955 Dear Mr. Presley, Never in my life have I been so embarrassed and ashamed! I have created a horrible misunderstanding. Please believe I NEVER meant to. I am not a man, and I do not work at a radio station. I am a girl. I go to Stephen Foster High School. I just turned fourteen. I should have written you all that in the first place. I have no excuse, except I guess I don't know how to write a proper fan letter. I thought it ought to say something useful. I guess I should not have written you at all. I mean, if I couldn't do it right. I did try. But writing flirty words to a person I've never met felt silly, and when I dotted my i's with little hearts and bubbles like the other girls, it just looked dumb. Also there's the matter of my name, a hideous bane that does not even tell you if I'm male or female. It sounds like an Italian woodcutter. "You bringa the AX-A, I choppa the wood." The first Achsa was a princess no one's ever heard of, in Second Chronicles, a Bible book nobody reads. I'm named for my great aunt Achsa. She probably hated it, too. I really CAN pick hit records, though. I'm not bragging. I knew the Moonglows' "Sincerely" would be a big hit a whole year before the McGuire Sisters recorded it. And I knew "Rock Around the Clock" would be a hit way, way before they used it in that movie "Blackboard Jungle." I listen to the radio every minute, especially late at night when Penelope the Dream Weaver comes on. I used to think all disc jockeys had to be men, but she's WONDERFUL! Her voice makes you think of a soft, silky Persian cat who lives off cigarettes and coffee -- if that makes any sense. She's on WDDO, Daddy-O Radio 1360. They play rhythm and blues. That's where I heard the Moonglows. Oh, dear, I've rattled on awfully. I guess now I owe you a second apology, for boring you. You probably think I'm silly, too. I wish you the best of everything in life. And may every one of your records climb to Number One on "Your Hit Parade." Sincerely, Achsa McEachern P.S. That is so sad about your brother. I never thought about it, but I guess twins always have someone to talk to, don't they. I wish I was a twin. * * * Memphis, Monday, February 28, 1955 Dear Achsa, I would of wrote sooner. We been on the raod. You can't be no 14! You write like you been tno COLLEGE! You are really cool. You know that? Something I do at night I go to Beale Street. It's the colored downtown here in Memphis. Music slips out the doors and windows of the clubs. I walk down the street and let it find me. It aint no Perry Como music neither. It is like nothing you ever heard. Colored church music, it is the same way. Sundays sometimes me and some boys sneak off from First Assembly and go sit in the back of this colored church just to hear them sing. Gospel is my most favorite kind of music. White AND colored. I really like getting your letters. I hope you write me again. I live at 462 Alabama Street, Memphis, Tennessee. You can write me there. Yours truly, Elvis P.S. Thank you for saying that about my brother. Back in Tupelo I used to go sit by his grave near every day. I talked to him like he had got born alive and him and me was still together. I been gone from there now seven years. I still miss him like it was yesterday. * * * Atlanta, Thursday, March 10, 1955 Dear Elvis Presley, Thank you for asking me to write you at your home address. You didn't have to do that if you didn't want to, so I guess you meant it. I really am just fourteen. But I'll be a senior next year, which probably accounts for why I sound so old. In grammar school my teachers kept promoting me up an extra grade every winter until Mama made them stop. She told them I'd never have any friends, but she was wrong. Linda Sheffield and I were best friends five whole years, until her family moved away in December. She got promoted mid-year, too, but only once. She's sixteen. She's got a boyfriend now and almost never writes. We used to tell each other everything. I liked your letter a lot, especially the Beale Street part. It's neat, too, about the Negro church. I'll tell you something I've never told a living soul. It goes all the way back to the first time Mama let me go by myself to the ladies restroom at the movies downtown. I was eight years old. The Ladies Room was upstairs and at first all that quiet made my ears feel stopped up. Then I heard this sound, a rustling or murmuring, like birds settling down for the night. It came from a big dark archway at the other end of the mezzanine. I was so young I pretended the carpet was a raging river, and I used its fat, red roses for stepping stones to cross over. Inside the archway, a red velvet rope was stretched across a flight of steep, concrete stairs. A gold-framed sign on the rope said, "This balcony is closed." But it didn't sound closed, it sounded full of whispers. I looked around and didn't see anyone, so I crawled under the rope and climbed the stairs. When I got to the top, I could not believe what I saw. It looked like I was standing at the back of a whole other theater. Only, the aisles weren't carpeted, and the chairs weren't upholstered, and all the people in the seats were Negroes. (That's what Mama says instead of "colored people." "Knee-grows." The way they say it in New York.") Negroes! Up there watching the movie just like the rest of us downstairs! Who were they? How did they get in? I was sure they were very special -- in all my life I had never seen a Negro in a white movie theater. I took a step closer, and a girl near my own age turned and saw me. She didn't move or make a sound. Just stared. I wanted to smile at her, but my mouth wouldn't let me. So I stared back until I couldn't bear her large eyes looking at me a second longer. That's when I turned and ran. I didn't stop until I got all the way back downstairs to the white people's theater, where I found my seat by the projector light shining on Mama's strawberry blonde hair. I felt icky inside, like I'd seen something I shouldn't have. That's why I never told. But ever since that day, every time I go to the movies my heart starts pounding, and I have to excuse myself and climb up to the Negro balcony. When I get there, all I do is stand in the back for a second, almost too scared to breathe. Then I turn around and run back down. I don't know why I keep doing it. Every time, I'm terrified the balcony will be empty. It's as if my heart won't calm down until I see them there. I hope you don't think I'm weird. Do you believe I'm doing wrong to keep going up there? I worry about that sometimes. I've thought and thought about it and I still don't have an answer. Now you know something about me no one else in the whole world knows, not even Linda Sheffield. Sincerely, Achsa * * * Memphs, Sunday, March 22, 1955 Dear Achsa, I can not believe any girl smart as you is writing me. I almost did not make it out of high school! I like it you wrote me about climbing to the colored balcony. I do not think you are weird. You are a very nice girl and you are not doing wrong at all. The Lord says we only do wrong if we have evil in our hearts. You don't have no evil in your heart climbing to the colored balcony. I don't have no evil in my heart on Beale Street neither. It is a magical place. I even buy my clothes there now. At this store where all the colored singers go. They are sharp dressers every one. Now I am too. I put on my black pants with the satin stripe and put on my pink jacket, and I can feel their songs inside me like a thunderstorm. I never before said that. Still it is a true thing. You told me something about you. Here is something about me. One day I am going to make enough money to buy my Mama and Daddy a big house and a Cadillac. But that aint the half of it. I am going to do something really big, I know it. I can feel it in me like the voice of the Lord. I think what it is is I am going to be a movie star. I want that more than anything. You ever see East of Eden? I seen it twelve times. I aim to be just as good a actor as that James Dean. Him and Marlon Brando they are the best. They don't never do no phony stuff. That is going to be me too. You are such a smart girl maybe you can help me. If you want to that is. I got to learn to talk good. I just lately come to understand how much that means. I may be from Mississippi but I aint stupid. I do not want to sound stupid neither. Do not get me wrong I dont aim to put on airs. It is just I dont want NOTHING not NOTHING AT ALL to hold me back if I can help it! So I am thinking maybe every time I write you you can write me back and point out something I been saying wrong. Then you can tell me how to say it right. If you want to that is. I will be honest I cant pay you nothing for it right away. I am fixing to rent my Mama and Daddy a house. But I know I can pay later and I will. Will you help me? Please? It would truly mean a lot. Please write back right away and let me know. I dont want to sound stupid no longer than I have to. Yours truly, Elvis P.S. I am six feet tall and got brown hair. Some folks say I look like Tony Curtis sometimes. What do you look like? I bet you are a real pretty girl. |
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