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I was browsing the Elvis Presley page on Wikipedia when I read a strange sentence:

During a two-week leave in early June, Presley cut five sides in Nashville.

I've never heard this phrase before. It doesn't really come up on Google, except in copies of the Wikipedia article. In context, it seems like it could mean something similar to "went on a whirlwind tour", but I'm not sure.

I would like to change the sentence to use a more common phrasing, so it can be understood by a wider audience, but I can't change it if I don't know what the original thought was!

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    A "side" of a record. Back in the olden days, music was recorded on disks, each having two sides. So Elvis "cut" or recorded five of them. – GEdgar Aug 21 '14 at 19:13
  • @Oran - if you could confirm that there were 5 songs recorded in that particular period I think you'd be good. – Matt Gutting Aug 21 '14 at 19:21
  • @MattGutting I found a track listing of the songs that were recorded. Thanks for the suggestion! – Oran D. Lord Aug 21 '14 at 19:45
  • @OranD.Lord You might rephrase as "During a two-week leave in Nashville in early June, Presley recorded five songs." – Matt Gutting Aug 21 '14 at 19:47
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    Not that it's quite relevant to the question, but I edited it to say "But then during a two-week leave in early June, Presley performed five songs during a recording session in Nashville." – Oran D. Lord Aug 21 '14 at 20:06
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It means he recorded five songs, I believe.

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  • Here's one site with a list of what Elvis did in June, and here's a track listing from the recording session (third from the bottom). This appears to be the answer. – Oran D. Lord Aug 21 '14 at 19:42
  • Good answer @BarbW; do you have any citations for using "cut N sides" meaning "recorded N songs"? That would fill out the answer a bit. – Matt Gutting Aug 21 '14 at 20:45
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One side in 1960 was in 10" 45 format. Which meant max time per side was about 10-11 minutes.

So Elvis did about 50-55 minutes of total music, which would roughly be a (long) modern CD.

Note that this is a long estimate. In likelihood they wouldn't be able to format the sides to hit the maximum that exact. Probably 10-12 songs, 40-45 minutes. Would need to look into his songs developed around that time and their length to figure out the exacts.

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