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There was also a trivia quiz and many different sellers/vendors who were selling CD’s, LP’s, 45 rpm’s, books, t-shirts and other souvenirs. I bought a CD with Johnny Earle & The Jordanaires, and a 45 rpm vinyl single with Anders Karlstedt. The tracks on Anders single were ”Goodbye Elvis” and ”Rock And A Hard Place”.

Back to the the performances! One session in the afternoon featured several interesting artists. The band T-Cat’s” from Stockholm did a couple of great rock n’ roll songs themselves, and then backed up the other artists: Jan Rhode (rock n’ roll legend from Norway), Anders Karlstedt (Elvis tribute artist), Jörgen ”Hubbas” Andersson (Elvis tribute artist) and Alexander Kling (a non-professional Elvis singer, that did a very nice job). “Hubbas” did a great version of “Johnny B. Goode”!

Then a young man dressed as Elvis in the ”G.I. Blues” uniform was introduced to the stage. His name was Franz von Bülow. He was not booked for the festival, and hardly anyone attending the festival knew who he was. Franz had phoned the arranger of the festival a few days earlier and asked if he could come and sing a few songs. Since the schedule was tight, he could only sing two songs, but they promised he could come back next year and sing more.. Franz had a heavy German accent, but sang with a fantastic Elvis voice a la 1961. His version of ”No More” was great. In my opinion, he was the best Elvis sound-alike performing at the festival this year. I thought that he even could look a lot like Elvis if he cut his hair shorter and colored it black…

The day program ended in the afternoon with the band Kyte . The members of the band are all in the early 20’s, which made them the youngest performers at this festival. They played really rocking and modern versions of old Elvis covers like A Little Less Conversation, Rubberneckin’

Among the artists featured at night were Red Hot Max, Kyte and Anders Karlstedt. Kyte did a very nice modern rocking version of Stranger In The Crowd.

This year’s festival was a great success. My friends and I had to drive two hours to get there and then home again, but it was well worth the drive.

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The Swedish Elvis Festival is an annual event arranged by the official Elvis Presley fan club in Sweden. It takes place on the Saturday of Hallowe’en weekend at City Hotel in Västerås, Sweden. This was its twenty-first year. It runs all day from 11 a.m until 1:30 at night.

One artist who performed was Micke Muster, who is Sweden’s own Jerry Lee Lewis. He learned to play the piano at a very early age, inspired by Elvis Presey and Jerry Lee Lewis. He is now one of the best piano-rockers in Sweden, and maybe also in the world. (Actually we have two, or probably more, world class piano players in Sweden. I was thinking of Robert Wells, who is also very talented, and has performed in London and China to name a few places. Jason D. Williams is also a favorite among the piano-rockers). Anyway, Micke Muster has released several CD’s, which also includes several Elvis songs).

Red Hot Max was the house band for a good part of the event.. They are a great rock ‘n’ roll and rockabilly band from Sweden. The band was formed by lead guitarist and singer Max Olsson in 1979. Some of the artists who performed with Red Hot Max were: Göran Danielsson (from the internationally known country-techno band Rednex), the Elvis gospel singer Kent Lundberg, Tone Norum, and Kvintetten Besk (”The Besk Quintet” in English).