The story behind the song
Bossa Nova Baby is an upbeat song that Elvis Presley recorded in 1963. It mixed the popular Brazilian bossa nova style of that time with rock and roll music.
Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller wrote the song. These two famous songwriters had created some of Elvis’s biggest hits in the 1950s, like Hound Dog and Jailhouse Rock. Bossa Nova Baby wasn’t written for Elvis and he wasn’t the first to record it. A group called Tippie and the Clovers recorded and released their version in 1962 on Tiger Records.
Elvis recorded his version on January 22, 1963, at Radio Recorders in Hollywood. Even though the song’s title took advantage of America’s huge interest in bossa nova at the time, the music actually combined vibrant garage-rock and Latin pop styles. The track featured a strong organ riff, trumpets that sounded like mariachi music, and backup singing from The Jordanaires and The Amigos. This showed how well Elvis could play different types of music.
The song was included in Elvis’s 1963 Paramount movie called Fun in Acapulco.
Bossa Nova Baby turned out to be one of Elvis’s best movie songs from the mid-1960s. It earned Gold certification and did really well on music charts. It reached #8 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, #20 on the U.S. Billboard R&B Singles chart, and #13 on the UK Singles Chart.
AT A GLANCE