This Day in History: American country music artist and songwriter Ronnie McDowell was born on this day in 1950. I really only know him for one song, "The King is Gone", a tribute to Elvis Presley, that was released shortly after Elvis' death in 1977. I was so torn up about Elvis dying that I went out and bought a 45 rpm record of this song as soon as I heard it.
The song peaked at number thirteen on Billboard's Hot 100 singles, and became a gold record. To date, "The King Is Gone" has sold more than 5 million copies. If you've ever seen the Kurt Russell Elvis movie, that was Ronnie McDowell's voice on there. McDowell also sang the Elvis vocals for the 1981 TV movie Elvis and the Beauty Queen and for the 1988 TV miniseries Elvis and Me, as well as a 1990 TV series called Elvis. McDowell also contributed to the 1997 Showtime special, Elvis Meets Nixon.
Wikipedia actually has an entry for "List of songs about or referencing Elvis Presley." There are well over 100 of them.
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