Mm Mm Mmmmmmmmm

It started off with a sublime performance of Madama Butterfly at the Four Seasons Centre and the wonderful duo of Yannick Muriel Noah and Brian Hymel as the doomed pair. I was awash in the most satisfying tears. I can never get over Act II, which is like a never-ending aria for the soprano, and Noah is heart-breaking. Then I floated home and lay about listening to Elvis Presley sing one of my favourite songs of all time, in my favourite rendition. This might seem an odd combination, but it works for me. I feel completely soaked in heady, neurotic, heart-aching pleasure.


Are You Lonesome Tonight?
(Music by Lou Handman and lyrics by Roy Turk, pub. 1926)

Are you lonesome tonight?
Do you miss me tonight?
Are you sorry we drifted apart?
Does your memory stray
To a bright summer day?
When I kissed you and called you Sweetheart?

Do the chairs in your parlor
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?

(Elvis speaks this next part:)
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, with you as my sweetheart;

Act one was when we met.
I loved you at first glance.
You read your lines so cleverly,
And never missed a cue

Then came act two.
You seemed to change;
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 to 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 they can bring the curtain down

(Sung:)
Is your heart filled with pain?
Shall I come back again?
Tell me, Dear,
Are you lonesome tonight?


Which reminds me of how much I love satellite radio, and how I'm torn continually between the Met Radio station and Elvis Radio (live from Graceland and hosted by someone called "Big Jim").



(Note to self: Take a lint brush to Bruce)