"Are You Lonesome To-night?," now often known as "Are You
Lonesome Tonight?," is a popular song with music by Lou Handman
and lyrics by Roy Turk. It was first published in 1926, and
most notably revived by Elvis Presley in 1960.
A number of artists recorded "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" in
1927. Composer Lou Handman himself played piano while his
sister Edith provided the vocals for a recording released on
the Gennett label. Vaughn DeLeath (also known as "The Original
Radio Girl") recorded the song twice, first on June 13, as solo
and later on September 21, as vocalist for The Colonial Club
Orchestra. Around August 1927, another version was released by
famed tenor Henry Burr.
The first charting version of "Are You Lonesome Tonight?"
was recorded by Blue Barron for MGM Records as catalog number
10628. The record first reached the pop chart on April 7, 1950
and lasted eight weeks there, peaking at number nineteen. Only
a few weeks after Barron's recording, Al Jolson recorded a
version of the song on April 28, 1950; it was released by Decca
Records as catalog number 27043.
In 1959 American songstress Jaye P. Morgan had a Billboard
#65 hit with it on the MGM label, backed by "Miss You". Elvis
Presley must have heard it while he was in the army in Europe,
as he also heard and was inspired by other songs like "O Sole
Mio" and "Return To Sorrento", which he made into hits on his
return in 1960.
This led to the best-known recording, by Elvis Presley,
recorded on April 4, 1960, and engineered by Nashville sound
pioneer Bill Porter. Colonel Parker (it was one of his wife's
favorite songs) persuaded Elvis to record his own rendition of
this song. Elvis' version was based on the Blue Barron
Orchestra in 1950 and the spoken part of the song (like Al
Jolson's) was loosely based on Shakespeare's using Jaques'
speech on Act II Scene VII: "All the world's a stage, and all
men and women merely players: they have their exits and their
entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts." It went
on to be one of the biggest-selling singles of 1960, peaking at
number one on the
Billboardpop chart for six weeks and peaking at number
three on the R&B charts .
Elvis, occasionally during live performances, would randomly
change lyrics to give them humorous connotations. One popular
instance was recorded at the International Hotel in Vegas on
August 26, 1969. During the performance, instead of singing:
"Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there", he sings
"Do you gaze at your bald head and wish you had hair". Moments
later, he saw a bald man in the audience (as legend has it),
and burst into laughter which continued into the next lines.
The audience was treated to additional laughter during the
spoken verse singing: "You know someone said that the world's a
stage, and each must play a part." Seeing the irony of his own
lyrics, Elvis was again overtaken by laughter and barely
recovered. The audience enjoyed the sincerity of the moment
while Elvis regained his composure. Meanwhile the band and
backup singers continued to keep the song going. It is
speculated that much of Elvis' mirth derived from the solo
backing singer whose falsetto remained resolute throughout. To
this, Elvis comes back just in time for the line: "And I had no
cause to doubt you" followed by more laughter. So overtaken,
Elvis encourages the backup singer to "sing it, baby" drawing
even more laughter which nearly brings the house down. In the
end, the song is finished to a round of applause. The version
is considered to be a popular underground classic, and was a UK
Top 30 hit in 1982 after first being commercially released by
RCA in the 1980 box set
Elvis Aaron Presley.
According to Dr. Demento, who plays the version on his show,
there is nothing on the label of the recording to indicate that
it is anything other than an ordinary recording of the
song--"People must have been surprised when they took it home
and played it."
Elvis said at the end, "That's it, man, fourteen years right
down the drain...boy, I'll tell ya."
In 1977, Presley again performed the song for the
Elvis in ConcertTV special. Similarly to 1969, he also
appears to mess up the spoken interlude, ad-libbing jokes
throughout. Whether this was intentional or not is unknown; the
1981 documentary film
This is Elvisuses footage of this performance to
illustrate Presley's physical deterioration near the end of his
life. Darrin Memmer's book "Elvis Presley - The 1977 CBS
Television Special," published in 2001 by Morris Publishing,
suggests it was intentional.
The Lettermen recorded the song as a track on their 1964
album
She Cried.
Doris Day recorded the song on June 6, 1967, in a version
included on
The Love Album.
Mr. Saks & The Blue Strings aka Tommy & The Tom Toms
recorded the song as an
instrumentalsingle in 1960 for noted producer Major Bill
Smith.
Elvis's version was listed at #81 on
Billboard's Greatest Songs of all time.[1]