Three had a hit with ‘Crying in the Chapel’
There are dozens of stories about Elvis Presley recording sessions and most of them mention Elvis clowning around in the studio before he finally decided to record.
One such recording session included his RCA recording “Crying in the Chapel.”
According to The Jordanaires’ Neal Matthews, “the session was scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. but due to Elvis and his clowning around, we didn’t actually start recording until 3 a.m. the next morning. So we were just about worn out waiting on him to record. He finally decided to get down to business and we began at 3 a.m. I think we did three takes on the song and what you heard on the record was the third take.”
Elvis recorded the song in November 1960 for his “His Hands in Mine” gospel album which RCA released in 1961 but the recording was not included due to a conflict with the publishing company that owned the song’s copyright. The Presley recording of “Crying In The Chapel” was not heard until his second gospel album “How Great Thou Art” which was released in 1967.
The song was written by Artie Glenn in 1953 when Glenn wrote it for his 16-year-old son Darrell to record. Darrell’s recording scored in country music’s top five and pop music’s top 10. It was Darrell’s first and only trip to the music charts.
Darrell Glenn died in 1990 at age 54.
According to Artie Glenn, the song was inspired by a real-life experience and is a narrative of him thanking God in a chapel for helping him through the worst times of his life and is a song of love and gratitude to God.
That same year, singing cowboy star Rex Allen recorded the song which scored in the top five country charts and in the top 10 pop charts. Between 1949 and 1968, Rex Allen placed seven songs on the country music charts – four of which placed on the pop charts. Rex Allen died in 1999 at age 78.
The song was also recorded by The Orioles, Ella Fitzgerald and Art Lund.
To subscribe to our free weekly “Country Music Classics” email newsletter: send a blank email to: country-music-classics-on@maillist.com.