Elvis Presley’s voice is known all over the world. The voice of the woman who sang with him at church when he was tiny is a lot harder to find.
Gladys Presley, Elvis’s mother, loved music. As her nephew Harold Loyd once said, “Not many people know this, but Aunt Gladys was a singer too.”
Harold was Elvis’s first cousin, the son of Gladys’s sister Rhetha. When he talked about his aunt, singing with her came up as one of his best memories.
In his words, “her voice was just amazing. She would sing all the time.”
He remembered sitting with her and “listening to Aunt Gladys sing and sometime Elvis and I would sing with her.”
Gladys saw the music in her son early. In 1956, she told the New York Daily Mirror about the little boy who couldn’t sit still when the singing started. “Even when he was a tiny kid and we sang at church and camp meetin’s, Elvis moved around and acted out his songs.”
Most fans only know Gladys’s singing through family stories like these, told by the people who heard her around the house.
But you can actually hear her.
It’s on an official Elvis release, the album made for the documentary “Elvis Presley: The Searcher.” Priscilla Presley, who was married to Elvis, went on TODAY when the film was new, so you can hear her talk about the documentary this album was made for.
Priscilla talks about “Elvis Presley: The Searcher” on TODAY
The soundtrack, “Elvis Presley: The Searcher (The Original Soundtrack),” came out on April 6, 2018, from RCA Records and Legacy Recordings. The deluxe 3-CD edition has a bonus disc of “additional recordings relevant to the film.”
Go all the way down that third disc to track 14. The listing says “Home Sweet Home” and credits it to Gladys Presley.
That’s her. Elvis’s mother, on an Elvis album, under her own name.
It’s easy to scroll right past it. The official Elvis site, ElvisTheMusic.com, even has a 30-second preview. One Italian Elvis fan site called her track the highlight of the whole soundtrack.
Not long before the album came out, Elvis Australia posted a video of Priscilla and Elvis’s longtime friend Jerry Schilling talking about Gladys singing “Home Sweet Home.” If you want to hear two people who knew Elvis well talk about it, start here.
Priscilla Presley and Jerry Schilling talk about Gladys singing “Home Sweet Home”
After that, you’ll want the real thing. Here’s the track itself, credited to Gladys Presley.
Listen to Gladys Presley sing “Home Sweet Home”
Gladys described a tiny boy moving around and acting out the songs at church. Harold remembered singing along with his aunt and his cousin. This track is about as close as any of us can get to that family music.
So next time you put on an Elvis record, it might be worth reaching for this one. Skip ahead to the third disc and give his mother a turn.