Whatever anyone's opinion of Elvis' movie career, particularly in the sixties, occasionally, despite the quality of many of the scripts presented to Elvis, a song would emerge from the endless soundtrack sessions which would become not just a hit but one which would immediately be synonymous with Elvis. One such song is the masterpiece which is "Can't Help Falling In Love" and by virtue of being his standard closing number to his 70's live shows became the song which he performed more than any other and would also have the unfortunate honour of being the very last song to be sung by Elvis Presley professionally when he closed his final live show in Indianapolis on 26 June 1977.
It is perhaps testament to the soundtrack of the movie from which the song originates, "Blue Hawaii" that Elvis would still be performing two songs from the movie soundtrack on stage even during his final tour with the other being the very song which closed the movie "Hawaiian Wedding Song". The soundtrack recordings for the movie took place at three sessions between 21 and 28 March 1961 at Radio Recorders Studio B in Hollywood and two separate master versions of "Can't Help Falling In Love" would be recorded with one for insertion into the movie and one for a single / album release.
Elvis and the musicians recorded a mammoth twenty nine takes with the first twenty six in the movie version style with take twenty three chosen as the movie version master but just three takes for the record version of which the only complete take, take twenty nine, would become the RCA record master. There is very little difference in the two versions apart from the intro with the movie version having a celeste acting as the music box but the record version had instead a piano intro. Both versions also differ in length with the movie version lasting one minute fifty three but the record version lasted exactly three minutes due to Elvis repeating from "...Like a river flows".
Written by Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, and George David Weiss. with a melody based on "Plaisir d'amour", a popular romance by Jean-Paul-Égide Martini (1784), the song unsurprisingly with Elvis' magnificent vocal and beautiful melody became a huge worldwide hit. The success of Elvis' original has caused many artists to release their own cover versions with the most successful being Andy Williams in 1970 and reggae band UB40 in 1993.
As with all of these videos, to get the most out of the re-edited audio, I highly recommend you use ear /headphones and turn the volume up as much as you dare!