Drummer for Elvis was part of wild ride

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — D.J. Fontana, a rock ‘n’ roll pioneer who rose from strip joints in his native Shreveport, Louisiana, to the heights of musical history as Elvis Presley’s first and longtime drummer, has died at 87, his wife said Thursday.

Karen Fontana said her husband died in his sleep in Nashville on Wednesday night. She said he’d been suffering complications from breaking his hip in 2016.

Fontana, a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, was the last surviving member of Elvis’ original core of musicians. He met Presley and the others on the Louisiana Hayride, a popular and influential radio and TV country music program based in Shreveport.

A regional act at the time, the 19-year-old Presley had been recording and touring since the summer with guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, the musicians Sun Records founder Sam Phillips brought in after Elvis turned up at the Memphis, Tennessee-based label’s studio.

Fontana was there for Presley’s first wave of success, from such hit singles as “Hound Dog” and “Jailhouse Rock” to his increasingly frenzied live shows and hip-shaking appearances on “The Ed Sullivan Show” and other TV programs.

He was on the “comeback” Christmas TV special of 1968 that featured Presley and fellow musicians jamming on a tiny stage before a studio audience, with Fontana keeping time on a guitar case.

Widely cited for reviving Presley’s career, that show was his first live performance in years and the last time Moore and Fontana worked with Elvis, who died in 1977.

Presley’s former wife, Priscilla Presley, issued a statement calling Fontana “a tremendously talented musician and a wonderful man.”