He’s all shook up – and why wouldn’t he be? Colin Greene is about to host the sixth annual Blue Mountains Elvis Festival, and already many sessions are sold out.
The festival will be held this year from Thursday August 16 until Sunday, August 19 and has expanded into four venues: The main two are the Palais Royale in Katoomba and Wentworth Falls Country Club, but there will also be shows at Wenty Bowling Club and the Family Hotel in Katoomba.
The idea came about after Mr Greene, a sign writer and music producer, and a friend visited the Elvis festival in Parkes.
“I’d never seen it and I couldn’t believe how good it was,” he said.
“I came back here [to Bullaburra] and was talking to people about it. They said it’s too hot, it’s too far or too expensive. And because I’m in the music business, I thought, why not start my own?”
He approached Katoomba RSL where he found an enthusiastic supporter in CEO Nick Darias. He hooked up with four ETAs (“that’s Elvis Tribute Artists – they’re not impersonators”) and, in 2013, held the inaugural festival.
“That first one I couldn’t do the Friday because they had the raffles, so we had Saturday and Sunday. It went OK – we had about 150-175 people at each session.
“I wasn’t sure I was going to do the second because it was so much work but I thought, oh well, let’s go around again.”
And each year it has become bigger and bigger. After the Katoomba RSL Club burnt down, he took the festival to the Country Club at Wentworth Falls – “the place was packed over three days” – and continues to fill additional venues.
While the vast majority of the acts are ETAs, he has allowed a few ring-ins – this year there will be a Tom Jones tribute and a Blue Brothers reboot.
This year, too, marks the first international act – UK performer Johnny Lee Memphis, who is ranked number 10 in the world of ETAs.
Yes, Elvis Tribute Acts are ranked.
“They have heats all around the world then in August they have the Ultimate Elvis Tribute Artist Competition,” Mr Green said. “These guys are more like Elvis than Elvis!”
The audience has a wild time, he said. They are “fanatics” who dress up to come to the shows. There are karaoke competitions all weekend, an Elvis lookalike competition, plenty of Miss Priscillas, there’s even a female Elvis – ShElvis.
It’s a lot of work and Mr Greene said he feels like “I’ve aged about 100 years”. It’s also costly – “How do you make a small fortune out of a festival? Start with a big fortune.”
But he’s had great support, including from Nick Darias, who has offered the use of the RSL buses to transport patrons from Wentworth Falls to Katoomba, and from the Family Hotel.
And for Colonel Col, as he’s now known (after Elvis’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker), the fun and pleasure he sees at each festival makes it worthwhile.
