The New York Times

Elvis Discovered in a New Jersey Basement!

By Jesse Holland Sept. 26, 1993

ROB LEVY, a piano dealer from Elizabeth who collects records, is no stranger to basements, attics and old record shops, where he has found all sorts of minor treasures. But what he found in a basement in New Jersey took his breath away: believed to be a one-of-a-kind 1957 Elvis Presley Christmas album, pressed in red vinyl as a keepsake by an RCA engineer.

“We’ve found what is probably the rarest record in the world in mint, pristine condition,” Mr. Levy said. “The black vinyl 1957 Elvis Presley Christmas Album is one of the most collectible albums on the market today, and we have the only one in red vinyl.”

But will the discovery catapult Mr. Levy and his two partners into a prominent place in the world of Elvis mythology? He, his partners and others say that this album should be a valuable collectible to record dealers and die-hard Presley fans. They hope it’s worth as much as $75,000, although four record dealers asked to estimate the record’s worth for this article suggested values that ranged from $2,000 to $10,000. The black vinyl version of the album is worth $500 to $1,500, the dealers said.

Mr. Levy and two friends who helped purchase the album, Freddie Nurman and Gene Van Severen, are still somewhat shaken by their good luck.

“Every record collector dreams of finding something like this,” said Mr. Nurman, an unemployed real estate salesman. “The odds of finding something like this are similar to the odds of winning the lottery.”

These three friends were brought together by their passion for record collecting. Mr. Levy and Mr. Nurman met at a collectors’ show in Cranford, while Mr. Levy and Mr. Van Severen met when Mr. Levy took him a stack of records to be appraised. In the stack was the cover to the 1957 Elvis Christmas album.

“I told him if he had that record along with the case, he’d have something valuable,” said Mr. Van Severen, who also works for the New Jersey Department of Vocational Rehabilitation. “I didn’t know he was actually going to go out and find one.” RCA Has Master Copy

Bernadette Moore, the archivist at RCA Records, which released Presley’s records, said the red disk might be valuable to collectors.

“We at RCA don’t put a value on things like that, because we have the master copies,” Mrs. Moore said. “However, Elvis collectors would probably consider something like a red vinyl Elvis record valuable.”

Mr. Nurman said he and his partners had already received an offer of $20,000.

“This is one of a kind,” Mr. Van Severen said. “The only other completely unique Elvis record known of at this point is the record he made for his mother.”

The three collectors said Elvis fans from as far away as Japan, Brazil and Argentina had inquired about the album. But the three men said they disagreed on whether they are going to sell it. Mr. Nurman wants to keep it. Mr. Levy wants to sell it. Mr. Van Severen can’t decide. So for now, they are keeping the record in a climate-controlled vault at a bank they declined to name.

They were extremely lucky to find the album, Mr. Levy said. A friend told him about a retired employee of an RCA record-pressing plant in Rockaway that had since closed; the man was selling his possessions to raise money for a move to Florida. Mr. Levy said that after the man sold him his collection of 2,000 records, he asked Mr. Levy if he wanted to see something special.

“That’s when he pulled out the Presley record,” Mr. Levy said. “He told me that he worked at the plant out in Rockaway back in 1957, when the regular record was being pressed. He decided to make a souvenir for himself and pressed out a red vinyl one from the wax used for the classical albums.”

Thinking it was a fake, Mr. Levy left it with its owner, but soon changed his mind.

“After I talked to some of my friends about it, they told me I was crazy not to go back to the old man,” Mr. Levy said. “I then called him back and started to negotiate for the record.”

Mr. Levy said that the former RCA employee, who asked him not to reveal his name, knew what he had. That’s when Mr. Nurman and Mr. Van Severen got into the act, they said.

“Rob found it, Gene appraised it and I negotiated for it,” Mr. Nurman said.

The collectors won’t say what they paid for the record, although Mr. Nurman said “it was a considerable sum.”

They said they have verified the authenticity of the album. “This red vinyl record contains speckling, which shows that it was pressed with the same machine that the black vinyl records were pressed with,” Mr. Van Severen said. “The machine was not cleaned out in between pressings of the black vinyl records and the red vinyl, and pieces of black wax got into the red vinyl. That’s one of the factors that convinced us that the record was authentic.”

They have not yet allowed other record appraisers to look at the album, however. Mr. Van Severen, who runs a record appraisal business from his home, said there would be nothing with which to compare the record. The three friends have not played the entire album. But what they did hear was the final test of authenticity. After about 30 or 40 seconds of “Santa Claus Is Back in Town,” they were convinced, they said, and the record went straight to the vault.

“Right now, we’re just going to bask in the glory of this record,” Mr. Levy said, smiling. “Maybe the King himself will come back and ask to buy it.”

A version of this article appears in print on Sept. 26, 1993, Section NJ, Page 13 of the National edition with the headline: Elvis Discovered in a New Jersey Basement!.