The fulfillment of a lifelong dream. Elvis had set out originally to be a gospel singer, and this album, even more than 1957’s Peace In The Valley, was intended as a tribute to his mother, whose death three years earlier had left him in an emotional quandary from which he would never fully recover. The album was in many respects a musical testimonial to the Statesmen, Elvis’ and his father’s favorite religious quartet, and the Blackwood Brothers, his mother’s, with more than a sidelong glance at the jubilee style of the Golden Gate Quartet. Initial sales may have been moderate compared to the pop albums, but His Hand In Mine, like the Christmas album, became a staple of the Elvis catalog.
