Free Republic

ROCK 'n' Roll turned 50 this morning when an Elvis Presley recording of That's All Right Mama played simultaneously on at least 1200 radio stations worldwide, organisers said. Stations from the UK to Ukraine and Canada to Mexico carried the song as it was fed from Sun Studios, in Memphis, Tennessee. That is where Presley, a 19-year-old truck driver and two other musicians, recorded what many historians call the first rock 'n' roll song. "It was clearly the Big Bang of Rock 'n' Roll," said Kevin Kane, of the Memphis Convention and Visitor's Bureau. Sun Studios is now a national...

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) Sam Phillips, who discovered Elvis Presley and helped usher in the rock 'n' roll revolution, died Wednesday. He was 80. Phillips died at St. Francis Hospital, spokeswoman Gwendolyn McClain said. No details were immediately available about the cause of death or how long he had been hospitalized. Phillips founded Sun Records in Memphis in 1952 and helped launch the career of Presley, then a young singer who had moved from Tupelo, Miss. He produced Presley's first record, the 1954 single that featured ``That's All Right, Mama'' and ``Blue Moon of Kentucky.'' ``God only knows that we didn't...