Quickfire: as BMG prepares to launch an extended DVD of the Elvis '68 Comeback special, the show's musical director, Bones Howe, remembers working with a legend.(Forum)

So, how did you get involved in the Comeback Special?

I was a sound engineer and I had a company with Steve Bender, who was a camera director. We heard Colonel Parker had gone to NBC with the idea of making a Christmas Special and we were called in. We thought it was a shame that Elvis had never been seen on TV as he really was live, so that's what we wanted to catch. I'd worked with Elvis as a tape splicer before he went into the army so we sat down and had a little reunion. We then spent several months putting the musicians together and he came to our office every day with his cigars and his Pepsi and we worked on ideas.

How was Elvis at the time?

You can see at the start that when he goes to grab the mike his hand is trembling. He was nervous because he didn't know how people were going to react. But by the time he'd sung eight bars he knew he had the audience in his hands. It gave me goosebumps. He was very professional to work with, though. I saw him in Las Vegas a few years later and even then he was still really serious about his music. But maybe he wasn't too serious about his life.

How did you direct the music?

A great portion of the music was pre-recorded, but the aim was to keep things sounding as close to live as possible So I just stuck him in the middle of the studio in front of a string section and he was such a great ...