In the 1950s and 1960s, many famous people were handed black belts they never earned. Elvis Presley was not one of them. He trained in karate for almost twenty years, under serious teachers in three different countries. He opened his own karate school. He reached a rank most students never touch. His karate nickname was Tiger.
It began in the Army. Stationed in West Germany in 1958, Elvis began training with a German Shotokan teacher named Jürgen Seydel, often at the teacher’s home. On leave in Paris, he took private lessons from Tetsuji Murakami, one of the top Shotokan men from Japan. He once trained with him for nine days straight.
Elvis Doing Karate
He also toughened his hands in Germany by banging his knuckles on hard surfaces to break boards. He came home holding a third-degree brown belt. In 1960, a teacher named Hank Slemansky put him through a punishing six-week test, because fake celebrity belts were everywhere. His verdict was blunt. “The kid ain’t pretty, but he’s tough and he’s a Black Belt.”
Then came the friendship that lasted for life. At a karate show at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in 1960, Elvis met Ed Parker, the founder of American Kenpo. Parker trained him on and off until the very end and became a trusted friend and bodyguard. Parker later wrote that singing was his first love, and the martial arts ran a close second.
Elvis Presley: Black Belt Karate Master
Karate shaped Elvis’s body movement during dancing. The kicks, the stances, and the sharp hand moves in his 1970s shows all came from it. Back in Memphis, his master, Kang Rhee, gave him the title “Tiger.” Elvis even funded a bigger Tennessee Karate Institute, where he trained beside world champion Bill Wallace.
On September 16, 1974, Rhee handed him an eighth-degree black belt at a quiet ceremony in Memphis. Today, Elvis is in the Martial Arts Hall of Fame, and one of his karate uniforms is on display at Graceland. Yet one trainer later admitted the sad part. He never let Elvis lose, because he feared what losing would do to the King’s pride.
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