"You Don't Know Me" is a song written by Eddy Arnold and Cindy Walker in 1955. "You Don't Know Me" was first recorded by Arnold that year and released as a single on April 21, 1956, on RCA Victor.^[1] The best-selling version of the song is by Ray Charles, who took it to number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1962, after releasing the song on his number 1 album Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. The first version of the song to make the Billboard charts was by Jerry Vale in 1956, peaking at number 14 on the pop chart. Arnold's version charted two months later, released as an RCA Victor single, 47–6502, backed with "The Rockin' Mockin' Bird", which reached number 10 on the Billboard country chart. Cash Box magazine, which combined all best-selling versions at one position, included a version by Carmen McRae that never appeared in the Billboard Top 100 Sides listing.

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Quick Facts Single by Eddy Arnold, B-side ...

"You Don't Know Me"
Single by Eddy Arnold
B-side	"The Rockin' Mockin' Bird"
Released	April 21, 1956
Recorded	1955
Genre	Country
Length	2:34
Label	RCA Victor
Songwriter(s)	Eddy Arnold Cindy Walker

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In his book Eddy Arnold: Pioneer of the Nashville Sound, author Michael Streissguth describes how Arnold and Walker composed the song:^[2]

Cindy Walker, who had supplied Eddy with "Take Me in Your Arms and Hold Me" (a number-one country record in 1949 and Eddy's first Cindy Walker release), recalled discussing the idea for "You Don't Know Me" with Eddy as she was leaving one of Nashville's annual disc-jockey conventions. "I went up to the Victor suite to tell Steve Sholes good-bye," she explained, "and just as I was leaving, Eddy came in the door." Arnold approached Walker with the title of the song: "I got a song title for you... 'You Don't Know Me.'" Walker, in jest, replied "But I know you!" to which Arnold retorted he was serious and proceeded to outline the story he had in mind. Walker promised to take Arnold's story and think about how to turn it into workable lyrics and melody, which eventually came naturally. "The song just started singing. It sort of wrote itself..."

The song, in a basic thirty-two-bar form, tells a narrative of a man, who has "never (known) the art of making love," and his friendly encounter with someone he knows but secretly loves—fearing rejection, the narrator never expresses his feelings toward the object of his affections and lets her walk away with another "lucky guy" (this lyric is gender-neutralized when sung by a woman), never knowing if she loves him back.

The best-selling version of the song is by Ray Charles, who took it to number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in September 1962, after releasing the song on his number 1 album Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music. It was the follow-up single to "I Can't Stop Loving You", which held the number 1 position for five weeks. After being released in July, it was kept from the number 1 spot by "Sheila" by Tommy Roe.^[3] This version also topped the Easy Listening chart for three weeks in 1962 and was used in the 1993 comedy film Groundhog Day. The song was the 12th number one country hit for Mickey Gilley in 1981.^[4]

The song has been performed or recorded by hundreds of artists, including Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, and Willie Nelson. Charles re-recorded the song with Diana Krall on his number 1 album of duets, Genius Loves Company, the only song common to both of Charles' two number 1 albums. It was sung by Meryl Streep in the 1990 film Postcards from the Edge, by John Legend in the 2007 Curb Your Enthusiasm episode "The Bat Mitzvah", by Robert Downey Jr. in the 1998 film Two Girls and a Guy, and by Lizzy Caplan.

Artists that released versions of the song: