Fulton Sun

Dan Smith is wearing work pants, a bright green t-shirt and a camouflaged hat. The hat covers the 47-year old’s shorter than usual salt and peppered hair which is accompanied by a close, stubbly shave.

That’s very descriptive but, in this instance, necessary for Smith, a self-described “famous nobody.”

If you see Smith around Callaway County, you’ll recognize his face. More likely, you’ll feel as though you’ve heard his voice before. Smith has used that voice and his life-long love of the guitar to channel Elvis Aaron Presley, the king of rock and roll.

For the better part of eight years, Smith has traveled state, nation and worldwide singing the King’s hits as Elvis GraceDan. Saturday night will be his final performance.

Less than an hour after his shift as a paper distributor at Xpedx in Columbia, Smith recalled the first time Presley’s music made a mark on him.

“I can remember where I was at and what I was listening to,” Smith recalled. “It was on an 8-track in Wainwright (Summit), Missouri on the Sunday of the week he died.”

Smith got his first whiff of Presley via his 1972 top-ten hit “Burning Love” on August 16, 1977, the day Presley died due to cardiac arrest at the age of 42.