As I like it, I’m trying to find new and special things about the artists I’m writing about. Some things are familiar to me, some are new. Today it’s about Sir Elton John.
- In 1979, Elton was the first Western rock star who performed in both countries Israel and USSR.
- Before using the name Elton, he failed his lead vocalist auditions for King Crimson, they chose Emerson, Lake & Palmer(Greg Lake – founder).
- He helped Eminem to fight his drug problems; It was unlikely that two opposite personalities to become good friends. They performed together Eminem’s song “Stan” at 2001 Grammy Awards; later on, Eminem recognized that Sir Elton helped him to get off the drug addiction. Eminem admitted to having a problem with prescription drugs and was treated for a near-fatal methadone overdose.
- As we all know, Elton is famous for his collaborations with many artists. In 1993 he released the album “Duets”; the single “Don’t Go Breaking’ My Heart” in collaboration with Kiki Dee (1976) and with Ru Paul. It became one of his greatest hits; what people don’t know is that Elton appeared on The Muppet Show” in 1978 – duet with Miss Piggy performing the same single beside three other hits.
- His favourite place for concerts is New York Madison Square Garden, it represents also the place where John Lennon performed for the last time and Elton John joined him on stage (1974, Thanksgiving Day); Elton declared in one of his interviews that it represented his favorite place in the whole world and he performed there for his 60th birthday (2007) and for a record-breaking 60th time (64 concerts until now).
- Birth name: Reginald Kenneth Dwight; the stage name was chosen by himself being inspired by the names of two blues legends, Elton Dean and Long John Baldry. He chose also a middle name, Hercules.
- On September 8th, 2011, he began his new show “The Million Dollar Piano“ at The Colosseum, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas; he performed his 3000th concert; Patrick Woodroffe and Mark Fisher directed and conceived that show (they are involved on the greatest world events of the last 25 years); that show, from The Colosseum, Caesars Palace, Las Vegas, was recorded for the whole world to see it in 1200 cinemas; Yamaha is the producer of the pianos used by Elton in his live concerts, including the famous Red Piano and a Million Dollar Piano, it took almost 4 years to make it, (over 68 video LED screens, an approximate weight of 1,451 kg).
- Although Elton John is wearing today only haute couture costumes, he is also famous for his unique stage outfits, fancy dress costumes: he weared extravagant clothes such as Tour Eiffel, Liberty Statue, Mozart, Donald Duck, 5000$ glasses having his name written on them with lights, ostrich feathers, baseball clothes, you can see here many extravagant clothes weared by Elton John over the time.
- Elton John is a great artist and he is the godfather of many children (children of famous artists): Sean Lennon (the son of John Lennon and Yoko Ono), Brooklyn and Romeo Beckham (sons of David and Victoria Beckham)and so on.
I’ll stop here. If you want to read other interesting things about Elton John and his career please go here or here or here.
Although there are many hits I could post here, I’ve decided to post only an old one, it was rearranged and it had a great contribution to his affirmation as artist “Crocodile Rock” at Madison Square Garden (2007). enjoy! 🙂
Featured image by Ernst Vikne – originally posted to Flickr as Elton John in Norway, CC BY-SA 2.0, Link
you can find other interesting things at the category: interesting birthdays