1 of Elvis Presley’s Most Emotional Songs Ended ‘Happy Days’ 11-Season Run
Elvis Presley‘s music and style were heavily featured throughout the television series Happy Days. The series, which focused on the decades of the 1950s and 60s, was a throwback to simpler times. The music reflected the eras and included some of Presley’s greatest hits. However, as the series’ cast ended its 11-season run, one Presley song took on a different meaning as it closed the book on the lives of the Cunningham Family and their friends.
What was the Elvis Presley song that ended ‘Happy Days’ 11-season run on ABC?
The final Happy Days episode wrapped up over a decade of stories surrounding Howard and Marion Cunningham (Tom Bosley and Marion Ross), their children Richie (Ron Howard) and Joanie (Erin Moran), and their friends. These included Arthur Fonzarelli (Henry Winkler), Ralph Malph (Donny Most), Potsie Weber (Anshon Williams), and Scott Baio (Chachi Arcola).
The episode featured the wedding of Joanie and Chachi. Family and friends from the past and present seasons of the series returned to celebrate.
In the series’ final moments, Bosley broke the fourth television wall and looked directly at the camera. He said to viewers, “So thank you all for being a part of our family. To Happy Days.”
Then, a montage of video clips was featured, encapsulating the most memorable moments of the show’s 11 seasons. Elvis Presley’s 1968 tune, “Memories,” was played as a soundtrack to the clips.
Why was ‘Memories’ significant to Elvis Presley fans?
Other than “the tune”Memories” used to close out Happy Days, one of the most popular television shows of the era, the song is also very significant to Elvis Presley fans. It was a song Presley performed during his ’68 Comeback Special.
Presley stepped off the stage after playing guitar during a musical segment he shared with Scotty Moore, DJ Fontana, Charlie Hodge, Alan Fortas, and Lance LeGault. He sat down on stairs between fans and sang “Memories.”
This sweet moment he brought Presley down to his fans, sitting among them as he performed the reflective tune. After shifting from concerts to movies for the better part of a decade, this televised concert was the first time the entertainer performed for fans.
Presley filmed more than four hours of footage for the NBC special. However, that content was whittled down to just under one hour before it debuted on NBC on Dec. 3, 1968.
Did Elvis Presley write ‘Memories’?
“Memories” was written especially for Elvis Presley’s ’68 Comeback Special. Mac Davis and Billy Strange penned the song.
In a 2019 interview with Songfacts, Davis discussed the song’s writing. He also dove into its meaning and why it was significant to the overall theme of the NBC special.
“Billy Strange asked me to write a song,” Davis explained. “The special was coming out, and they were looking for a song to bookend a section of the show where he went back and did his ’50s hits, the old Sun Studios things, and they wanted it to be about looking back over the years. I had a little over 24 hours to write it.”
Davis said he sat up all night writing the song in an office in Strange’s garage. Watching Presley perform the song was quite meaningful for the singer/songwriter.
“They were actually going to sing part of the song in the first half of that segment, at the beginning of it, and another one like a bookend. But he ended up just sitting down at the edge of the stage. It was really nice, the way he did it,” Davis shared.
Mac Davis later admitted that he was glad he had that opportunity as it opened a door to continue to work with Elvis Presley. He would go on to pen two Presley classics, “A Little Less Conversation” and “In the Ghetto.”
Davis would have solo hits, including “Baby Don’t Get Hooked on Me,” “Stop and Smell the Roses,” and “One Hell of a Woman,” which propelled him to being named Entertainer of the Year by the Academy of Country Music in 1974.
