FROM THE VAULT: ARE YOU LONESOME TONIGHT? (ELVIS LAUGHING VERSION)

From Bytes

Saturday, January 30, 2010

Are You Lonesome Tonight? was written in 1926 and has been covered by various artists since that date. Even Al Jolson recorded it in 1950. Elvis covered it in 1960. He was reluctant but was persuaded by his manager. Colonel Tom Parker, it being one of the Colonel's wife’s favourite songs. Colonel Tom was on the money: the single hit No 1 and stayed there for 6 weeks.

The lyrics are terribly cheesy:

Are you lonesome tonight?

Do you miss me tonight?

Are you sorry we drifted apart?

Does your memory stray to a bright sunny day

When I kissed you and called you sweetheart?

Do the chairs in your parlour seem empty and bare?

Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there?

Is your heart filled with pain, shall I come back again?

Tell me dear, are you lonesome tonight?

I wonder if you’re lonesome tonight.

You know someone said that the world's a stage

And each must play a part.

Fate had me playing in love you as my sweetheart.

Act one was when we met, I loved you at first glance

You read your line so cleverly and never missed a cue

Then came act two, you seemed to change and you acted strange

And why I’ll never know.

Honey, you lied when you said you loved me

And I had no cause to doubt you.

But I’d rather go on hearing your lies

Than go on living without you.

Now the stage is bare and I’m standing there

With emptiness all around

And if you won’t come back to me

Then make them bring the curtain down.

Is your heart filled with pain, shall I come back again?

Tell me dear, are you lonesome tonight?

All of this is introduction to the clip I want to introduce to you.

In 1969 Elvis was doing a gig in Vegas when he reached the point in his act for singing Are You Lonesome Tonight? He had a solo backing singer, Kathy Westmoreland.

When Elvis got to the lyrics “Do you gaze at your doorstep and picture me there?”, he changed them to “Do you gaze at your bald head and wish you had hair?”

At this point he also saw a bald man in the audience and began laughing, although there are also stories that a bald man in the audience took off his toupee.

Whatever the cause, he laughs.

The backing singer keeps singing. Without Elvis’s singing, the falsetto backing becomes wailing, touching off more laughter by Elvis to the point that he loses it, encouraging his backing singer to “sing it baby…”.

Listen to it at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWOImR8YoCU

The visuals are just background to the audio, the visuals are not of the laughing Elvis performance.

He has a great laugh and it is infectious - see if you don’t end up laughing or at least smiling.

Thank ya verry moch.