The future King of Rock 'n' Roll first visited the Grand Ole Opry in 1954. Few of the local subjects, country music's true believers, were impressed.

Chet Atkins complained that Elvis seemed to be wearing eye makeup. The only compliment Elvis got was a backhanded one from the Opry's Jim Denny. The 19-year-old and his new music didn't quite fit Nashville, Denny said, but "this boy is not bad."

Ouch.

Today, all is forgiven. Elvis Aron Presley -- somewhat inexplicably -- gets inducted into Country Music's Hall of Fame. He's joined by Tammy Wynette and two others in the class of '98.

The honor comes 21 years after Presley's death and 12 years after his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Presley, over the course of his career, did post 11 No. 1 country singles. But most of his music was the kind of stuff that made many country fans cringe.

"Some people may be up in arms about Elvis Presley going into the Hall of Fame," acknowledged Ed Benson, executive director of the Country Music Association.

But he said Elvis' influence on the current generation of country artists -- Travis Tritt and Dwight Yoakam, for instance -- was one of the keys to opening the hall's doors for Presley.

Presley is already a charter member of the rock museum in Cleveland, where a major exhibition on the King's life opened in August. It was the museum's first exhibit dedicated to a single artist. The country constituency wasn't as quick to claim Elvis as its own.

It was Oct. 2, 1954, when Elvis, just out of Memphis' Humes High School, climbed into Sun Records boss Sam Phillip's black Cadillac with bandmates Scotty Moore and Bill Black to venture up to Nashville. They didn't know what to expect.

Elvis Co. had never ever been inside the Opry. The Opry's big stars viewed Elvis "with all the remoteness, whether real or perceived, of big leaguers sniffing at bushers just up from the minor," Peter Guralnick wrote in his acclaimed Elvis biography, "Last Train to Memphis."

The fans weren't much better. Many of them viewed Presley's cover of bluegrass star Bill Monroe's "Blue Moon of Kentucky" as "a desecration," Guralnick wrote.

Elvis was so intimidated that he nearly bolted before performing. "They're going to hate me," he told a local radio station program director.

They didn't hate him. But they didn't love him, either.

The Opry's audience, after hearing Elvis perform his jacked-up version of "Blue Moon of Kentucky," was a "polite, but somewhat tepid, reception," Guralnick observed.

Is it any wonder Elvis preferred shooting out televisions in Las Vegas rather than Nashville?

Anyway, Elvis' big break wasn't the Opry gig; it was a series of national TV appearances, culminating in 1956 with "The Ed Sullivan Show." He didn't play any country tunes; before a crowd of screaming teen-age girls, Elvis performed "Don't Be Cruel," "Love Me Tender," "Ready Teddy" and "Hound Dog."

There was one country musician who "got" Presley right away: Monroe. He offered Presley some kind words and said he planned to do a version of "Blue Moon" using the Sun arrangement.

Monroe was inducted into the rock hall as an early influence in 1997, one year after his death.

TELEVISION

"32nd Annual Country Music Awards"

Today, 8-11 p.m., CBS (Channels 2, 8).

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Published 9/23/1998