{"id":564693,"date":"2026-03-26T02:40:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T02:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/564693\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T02:40:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T02:40:11","slug":"born-on-this-day-in-1950-the-elvis-presley-superfan-who-launched-his-illustrious-career-with-a-tribute-song-to-the-king","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/564693\/","title":{"rendered":"Born on This Day in 1950, the Elvis Presley Superfan Who Launched His Illustrious Career With a Tribute Song to The King"},"content":{"rendered":"

Elvis Presley was objectively the biggest music star in the world when he died<\/a> on Aug. 16, 1977, at age 42. The news sent scores of music fans into mourning, including a 27-year-old Vietnam War veteran named Ronnie McDowell from Portland, Tennessee. The Elvis superfan channeled his grief into a song called \u201cThe King is Gone\u201d. He then recorded the track on the independent Scorpion record label. The song rocketed McDowell\u2014born on this day (March 25) in 1950\u2014to national fame. And as it turns out, that was only the beginning. Celebrating his 76th birthday today, Ronnie McDowell has since notched more than 30 Top 40 hits on the country music charts. His catalog includes the No. 1 singles \u201cOlder Women\u201d and \u201cYou\u2019re Gonna Ruin My Bad Reputation.\u201d<\/p>\n

How Ronnie McDowell Went From Elvis Impersonator to Country Star<\/p>\n

Selling more than 5 million copies to date, \u201cThe King is Gone\u201d peaked at No. 13 on the Hot 100. Five months after its release, Ronnie McDowell performed the song on the NBC special Nashville Remembers Elvis on His Birthday. In 1979, he covered 36 of the King\u2019s songs for the TV movie Elvis, in which Kurt Russell\u2014who played Presley\u2014lip-synched to McDowell\u2019s vocals.<\/p>\n

In 1978, McDowell landed another Top 5 country hit with \u201cI Love You, I Love You, I Love You.\u201d He also contributed vocals to various Presley-related projects, including the 1988 TV miniseries Elvis And Me. Weary of being pigeonholed<\/a> as a King impersonator, McDowell teamed up with producer Buddy Killen at Epic Records hoping to expand his horizons.<\/p>\n

In 1981, he scored his first No. 1 country hit with \u201cOlder Women.\u201d This kicked off a string of 11 straight Top 10 hits, including a second chart-topper, 1983\u2019s \u201cYou\u2019re Gonna Ruin My Bad Reputation.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 1986, Ronnie McDowell teamed up with Conway Twitty for the Top 10 duet \u201cIt\u2019s Only Make Believe.\u201d He has continued to perform well into his 70s, even taking the stage while awaiting surgery following a near-fatal stroke onstage in June 2025.<\/p>\n

[RELATED: Doctor Reveals What Kept 75-Year-Old Country Icon Alive After His Onstage Medical Scare]<\/a><\/p>\n

Even at the height of his fame, McDowell never gave into the \u201crockstar\u201d lifestyle. He never smoked or dabbled in drugs, and always preferred plant-based food, Decades later, his doctor says those choices kept him alive after the medical incident.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was quite unbearable. The swelling and how I felt was just terrible,\u201d he told Taste of Country<\/a> in August. \u201cBut I\u2019m improving every day.\u201d<\/p>\n

Featured image by Rick Diamond\/Getty Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Elvis Presley was objectively the biggest music star in the world when he died on Aug. 16, 1977,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":564694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[127117,64,63,6982,134,136,278028],"class_list":{"0":"post-564693","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-1950s","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-country-music","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-ronnie-mcdowell"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}