The Ronnie James Dio Story "Elf"

Following on the Ronnie James Dio Story Part 1 the early years, here is the sequel. The story of Elf (1970-1975), another name change. The band began to take a more professional form. There are now even regularly released LPs. The lineup now is Ronnie James Dio, vocals and bass, Doug Thaler on keyboards,  Gary Driscoll on drums and David Feinstein (Dio's nephew) on the guitar.

The band was formed in 1967 when the members of Ronnie Dio and the Prophets transformed themselves into The Electric Elves and added a keyboard player, Doug Thaler.

In February 1968, the band was involved in an automobile accident which claimed the life of Nick Pantas. The accident forced a shuffling of the band member roles as original keyboardist Thaler moved to guitar (after recovering from his injuries) and the group hired Mickey Lee Soule to take over keyboard duties. (Upon leaving the group in 1972, Thaler moved to New York and got a job as a booking agent — Elf was one of the bands he booked.)

Elf's self-titled debut album was produced by Deep Purple members Roger Glover and Ian Paice, who happened to see Elf auditioning in 1972. For the next few years, the band enjoyed mild success as an opening act for Deep Purple.

Ronnie both sang and played the bass guitar until, following the release of Elf's first album, Craig Gruber was asked to join as bass guitarist. In August 1973 Feinstein quit the band and was replaced by Steve Edwards. In 1974, Elf released it´s second album, Carolina County Ball. That same year Dio was asked by Roger Glover to sing on his solo album, The Butterfly Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast. Dio's voice gained the attention of Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, who was beginning to tire of Deep Purple and was looking for musicians to record a solo album. Apart from guitarist Steve Edwards (and percussionist Mark Nauseef), he decided in early 1975 to use the musicians in Elf for this album, and the band Rainbow was soon formed.  Though Elf had been writing and recording its third album, Trying to Burn the Sun at the same time, following the completion of that album and the Rainbow album, Elf was no more. Trying to Burn the Sun was eventually released in the U.S. in June 1975.

Although there had been occasional speculation (beginning in the late 1990s) by some of the former members about an Elf reunion, nothing formal ever took place, and with the death of Ronnie in 2010 it would lack a key member.

Official website            

Padavona.com For more information, photos, music, videos, etc. Unofficial Elf biography on www.Dio.net

Listen to early Elves and Electric Elves tracks  Ronnie James Dio site

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