Lisa Marie Presley dies at 54 after suspected cardiac arrest

Lisa Marie Presley, a musician and the only child of rock ‘n’ roll legend Elvis Presley, has died at the age of 54.

“It is with a heavy heart that I must share the devastating news that my beautiful daughter Lisa Marie has left us,” her mother, Priscilla Presley, said in a statement Thursday evening. “She was the most passionate, strong and loving woman I have ever known.”

The announcement came just hours after Priscilla Presley had confirmed that Lisa Marie Presley had been rushed to hospital in Los Angeles, United States.

News of Presley’s admission to hospital was first reported by TMZ and later confirmed by People magazine.

Los Angeles County paramedics were dispatched to a Calabasas home at 10:37am (18:37 GMT) following a report of a woman in full cardiac arrest, according to Craig Little, a spokesperson for the county’s fire department. Property records indicate Presley was a resident at the address.

Presley attended the Golden Globes on Tuesday, where Austin Butler was named best actor for his portrayal of her father in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis. She called his performance “mind-blowing” during a red-carpet interview with Entertainment Tonight.

“I really didn’t know what to do with myself after I saw it,” she said of the film.

“I had to take, like, five days to process it because it was so incredible and so spot on and just so authentic that, yeah, I can’t even describe what it meant.”

Just days before that, she had been in Memphis, Tennessee, at Graceland – the mansion where Elvis lived – to celebrate the anniversary of her father’s birth on January 8.

Lisa Marie Presley was born in 1968 – the only child of Priscilla and Elvis – and was nine years old when her father died in 1977.

She shared her father’s brooding charisma and low, sultry voice and eventually followed him into the music industry, making her debut in 2003 with the album To Whom It May Concern, which made the top 10 of the Billboard 200 album chart. She followed it two years later with Now What, which also made the top 10.

A third album, Storm and Grace, was released in 2012 and she even formed direct musical ties with her father, adding her voice to such Elvis recordings as In the Ghetto and Don’t Cry Daddy, a mournful ballad that reminded him of the early death of his mother, and Lisa Marie’s grandmother, Gladys Presley.

“It’s been all my life,” she told the Associated Press news agency in 2012 of her father’s influence. “It’s not something that I now listen to and it’s different. Although I might listen closer. I remain consistent on the fact that I’ve always been an admirer. He’s always influenced me.”

She was married four times including to actor Nicolas Cage and singer Michael Jackson. She had four children and was devastated when her son Benjamin Keough died by suicide in 2020.

Lisa Marie became the sole heir of the Elvis Presley Trust when her father died.

Along with Elvis Presley Enterprises, the trust managed Graceland and other assets until she sold her majority interest in 2005.

She retained ownership of Graceland Mansion and the land around it. Her son is buried there, along with her father and other members of the Presley family.