"Are You Lonesome Tonight?"

Backdated, archival post

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For my Collection Audit project, I'm listening to The Essential Elvis Presley.  In the spoken part in "Are You Lonesome Tonight?," there's a reference to Shakespeare's "All the world's a stage" from As You Like It:  "You know, someone said that the world's a stage and each must play a part."

This reminded me that there are references to that same line in "A Moment in Time" from the Zombies' Breathe Out, Breathe In and "Circus" from Argent's Circus.

"Are You Lonesome Tonight?" is from 1960, so it's after the Elvis period that Rod Argent really likes (he said that in the first three years, Elvis' voice was "transcendent").  (I think one of the Beatles said that after Elvis was in the army, his music wasn't as good, which seems to be the same position that Argent takes.)  It's unlikely then that this Shakespeare reference inspired the same Shakespeare reference in these Argent-related songs, but I still think it's interesting that - despite how "Are You Lonesome Tonight?" is after that revered Elvis period - it has that same reference in common.