<P> In spite of the facts that Nat King Cole had the # 7 song in 1959 , and the # 1 song in 1961 , and Chuck Berry had a major hit with `` Maybellene '' in 1955 , in the United States in the 1950s legal segregation and discrimination against African Americans was common , especially in the Deep South . Presley would nevertheless publicly cite his debt to African American music , pointing to artists such as B.B. King , Arthur `` Big Boy '' Crudup , Ivory Joe Hunter , and Fats Domino . The reporter who conducted Presley 's first interview in New York City in 1956 noted that he named blues singers who `` obviously meant a lot to him . ( He ) was very surprised to hear him talk about the black performers down there and about how he tried to carry on their music . '' Later that year in Charlotte , North Carolina , Presley was quoted as saying : `` The colored folks been singing it and playing it just like I 'm doin ' now , man , for more years than I know . They played it like that in their shanties and in their juke joints and nobody paid it no mind ' til I goosed it up . I got it from them . Down in Tupelo , Mississippi , I used to hear old Arthur Crudup bang his box the way I do now and I said if I ever got to a place I could feel all old Arthur felt , I 'd be a music man like nobody ever saw . '' Little Richard said of Presley : `` He was an integrator . Elvis was a blessing . They would n't let black music through . He opened the door for black music . '' B.B. King said he began to respect Presley after he did Arthur `` Big Boy '' Crudup material and that after he met him , he thought the singer really was something else and was someone whose music was growing all the time right up to his death . </P>
<P> In spite of the facts that Nat King Cole had the # 7 song in 1959 , and the # 1 song in 1961 , and Chuck Berry had a major hit with `` Maybellene '' in 1955 , in the United States in the 1950s legal segregation and discrimination against African Americans was common , especially in the Deep South . Presley would nevertheless publicly cite his debt to African American music , pointing to artists such as B.B. King , Arthur `` Big Boy '' Crudup , Ivory Joe Hunter , and Fats Domino . The reporter who conducted Presley 's first interview in New York City in 1956 noted that he named blues singers who `` obviously meant a lot to him . ( He ) was very surprised to hear him talk about the black performers down there and about how he tried to carry on their music . '' Later that year in Charlotte , North Carolina , Presley was quoted as saying : `` The colored folks been singing it and playing it just like I 'm doin ' now , man , for more years than I know . They played it like that in their shanties and in their juke joints and nobody paid it no mind ' til I goosed it up . I got it from them . Down in Tupelo , Mississippi , I used to hear old Arthur Crudup bang his box the way I do now and I said if I ever got to a place I could feel all old Arthur felt , I 'd be a music man like nobody ever saw . '' Little Richard said of Presley : `` He was an integrator . Elvis was a blessing . They would n't let black music through . He opened the door for black music . '' B.B. King said he began to respect Presley after he did Arthur `` Big Boy '' Crudup material and that after he met him , he thought the singer really was something else and was someone whose music was growing all the time right up to his death . </P>
this musical genre had a strong influence on elvis presley
this musical genre had a strong influence on elvis presley
African American music
African American music