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A tomb fit for a king?

Try The Pyramid fit for one Elvis Presley, who appears tonight at the downtown venue in a 25th anniversary extravaganza that pays as much tribute to the performer as it does his fans.

We did say virtual Elvis, right? When Presley enters the building, he’ll be bigger than life, broadcast on towering video screens that fictively suggest the singer - who died on this day in 1977 - is still around, still interacting with his TCB band (who will be performing live). For those who have seen the show’s working model, which has toured internationally as “Elvis - The Concert” since 1998, you know the illusion can be pretty convincing.

Yet ticket-buyers can expect much more than a recap of the above concept, which has played Memphis several times. It even promises more bang for the buck than the prototype, “Elvis in Concert ‘97,” which premiered at Mid-South Coliseum for the 20th anniversary of Elvis Week.

“It’s our splashiest, most elaborate production ever,” says Todd Morgan, spokesman for the concert organizer, Elvis Presley Enterprises. “This is a one-night-only show, a one-of-a-kind event.”

According to Morgan, the show will not only feature a career’s worth of musicians and singers who performed with the King, it will have them playing to new footage as well.

Most of Presley’s performances in “Elvis - The Concert” are from two films, the 1973 television special Elvis, Aloha from Hawaii, via Satellite and the 1970 documentary Elvis, That’s the Way It Is. And it’s that setup which occupies the second half of The Pyramid spectacle, albeit with a fuller cast.

Act I, however, will feature interactive segments from the ’50s and the ’60s plus a gospel segment. The bits of filmed concert footage from the ’70s were recorded in multi-tracks (meaning Presley’s microphone had its own track, thereby allowing his vocal to be isolated for the new show’s live mix). Not so with the earlier material. It’s been a challenge, but Morgan feels the result will please fans.

“There aren’t a lot of isolated vocal recordings for the filmed performances of Elvis before 1970,” he says. “But we’ve been working around those obstacles and limitations.”

So what about the real musicians? Among confirmed guests are members of the TCB Band including James Burton, Glen D. Hardin, Jerry Scheff and Ronnie Tutt; Presley’s musical director in the ’70s, Joe Guercio; saxophone great Boots Randolph; Elvis drummer D. J. Fontana; and a bounty of backup singing groups from the Imperials and the Sweet Inspirations (with onetime member and Whitney Houston’s mom, Cissy Houston, rejoining for the night) to the Jordanaires and former members of the Stamps (whose late leader J.D. Sumner will put in a virtual appearance).

Plus, Priscilla and Lisa Marie Presley are scheduled to be there “to enjoy the show and speak to the crowd,” according to Morgan.

Only one artist is conspicuously missing, guitarist Scotty Moore, who’ll be at Gibson Beale Street Showcase Lounge tonight revisiting his own Elvis memories with ex-Stray Cats bassist Lee Rocker.

All in all, it’s a triumphant return for Presley, who has toured the world with his interactive bad self.

Tickets are going fast for this one, says Morgan. Capacity at The Pyramid for this particular staging is 11,400 and seats are filling up, though some tickets being held for media, sponsors and the like might be made available at the last minute.

Nonetheless, “we’re virtually sold out,” says Morgan. Which befits a legend virtually there.

Elvis: The 25th Anniversary Concert plays The Pyramid 8 p.m. tonight. Tickets are $75, $50 and $20 (proceeds after production costs benefit the Elvis Presley Charitable Foundation). Visit http://www.elvis.com for more info. For tickets, call The Pyramid box office or Ticketmaster at 525-1515.

- Bill Ellis: 529-2517