"This Masquerade" is a song written by Leon Russell

Leon Russell

Claude Russell Bridges , known professionally as Leon Russell, is an American musician and songwriter, who has recorded as a session musician, sideman, and maintained a solo career in music....

. The song appeared on the B-side of the single for Russell's 1972 hit "Tight Rope."

The song has also been recorded by many other artists. Helen Reddy

Helen Reddy

Helen Reddy , often referred to as "The Queen of 70s Pop", is an Australian-American singer and actress. In the 1970s, she enjoyed international success, especially in the United States, where she placed fifteen singles in the Top 40 of the Billboard Hot 100. Six of those 15 songs made the Top 10...

 included it on her 1972 I am Woman

I Am Woman

"I Am Woman" is a song cowritten by Helen Reddy and singer/songwriter/guitarist Ray Burton and performed by Reddy. Released in its most well-known version in 1970, the song became an enduring anthem for the women’s liberation movement.-Success:...

album, and also included a live version on her 1978 Live in London

Live in London

Live in London may refer to:*Live in London *Live in London *Live in London , by Amon Düül II, 1973*Live in London *Live in London...

album. The Carpenters

The Carpenters

Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo, consisting of sister Karen and brother Richard Carpenter. The Carpenters were the #1 selling American music act of the 1970s. Though often referred to by the public as "The Carpenters", the duo's official name on authorized recordings and...

 recorded a version of the song and released it on their 1973 Now & Then album, as well as on the B-side of "Please Mr. Postman" in 1974. Shirley Bassey

Shirley Bassey

Dame Shirley Bassey, DBE , is a Welsh singer. She found fame in the late 1950s and was "one of the most popular female vocalists in Britain during the last half of the 20th century"...

 has also recorded this song, first released on her 1982 album All By Myself. Other artists to perform it include, Willie Nelson, Sérgio Mendes

Sergio Mendes

Sérgio Santos Mendes is a Brazilian musician. He has released over thirty-five albums, and plays bossa nova heavily crossed with jazz and funk....

 & Brasil '77, No Mercy

No Mercy (band)

No Mercy is an American pop and dance music group formed by Frank Farian in Florida in 1995, consisting of Marty Cintron , and twin brothers, Ariel and Gabriel Hernández , from Miami, Florida.-Career:In 1996, No Mercy released their debut album titled No Mercy, later re-released in Europe retitled My...

, Robert Goulet

Robert Goulet

Robert Gerard Goulet was a Canadian American entertainer as a singer and actor. He played the role of Lancelot in the Broadway musical Camelot of 1960.-Early life:...

, Bob Berg

Bob Berg

Bob Berg was a jazz saxophonist originally from Brooklyn, New York City. He started his musical education at the age of six when he began studying classical piano. He began playing the saxophone at the age of thirteen. Bob Berg was a Juilliard graduate influenced heavily by the late 1964–67 period...

 and Kenny Rogers

Kenny Rogers

Kenneth Donald "Kenny" Rogers is an American singer-songwriter, photographer, record producer, actor, and entrepreneur...

. The song was also a top-ten pop and R&B hit for jazz

Jazz

Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...

 guitarist

Guitarist

A guitarist is a musician who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselves on the guitar while singing.- Versatility :The guitarist controls an extremely...

/vocalist George Benson

George Benson

George Benson is a ten Grammy Award winning American musician, whose production career began at the age of twenty-one as a jazz guitarist....

, who recorded it on his 1976 signature album Breezin'

Breezin'

Breezin' is an album by jazz/soul guitarist George Benson.The album marked the beginning of Benson's most successful period commercially. Breezin topped the Pop, Jazz and R&B album charts in Billboard and spun off two hit singles, the title song and "This Masquerade," which was a top ten pop and...

. It reached number ten on the Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

 and number three on the Hot Soul Singles

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs

Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...

 chart. Benson won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year

Grammy Award for Record of the Year

The Record of the Year is one of the four most prestigious Grammy Awards presented annually. It has been awarded since 1959.-History:The honorees through its history have been:*1959-1965: Artist only.*1966-1998: Artist and producer....

 with his version of the song. Mia Martini recorded a live version in 1991. Saxophonist David Sanborn

David Sanborn

David Sanborn is an American alto saxophonist. Though Sanborn has worked in many genres, his solo recordings typically blend jazz with instrumental pop and R&B. He released his first solo album Taking Off in 1975, but has been playing the saxophone since before he was in high school...

 also recorded the song on his 1995 "Pearls" project.

Leon Russell

Leon Russell

Claude Russell Bridges , known professionally as Leon Russell, is an American musician and songwriter, who has recorded as a session musician, sideman, and maintained a solo career in music....

's version is part of the soundtrack for the Exorcist

Exorcist

In some religions an exorcist is a person who is believed to be able to cast out the devil or other demons. A priest, a nun, a monk, a healer, a shaman or other specially prepared or instructed person can be an exorcist...

director William Friedkin

William Friedkin

William Friedkin is an American film director, producer and screenwriter best known for directing The French Connection in 1971 and The Exorcist in 1973; for the former, he won the Academy Award for Best Director...

's psychological thriller film Bug. The Bug Soundtrack

Bug (2007 soundtrack)

Bug is the original soundtrack album, on the Lionsgate label, of the 2006 film Bug, and contains such artists as Sean & Sara Watkins , Chainsaw Kittens, Susan Tedeschi, Jerry Leiber, Leon Russell and more. The theme from Bug is performed by System of a Down lead singer Serj Tankian...

is released on May 22, 2007. It also appeared in the movie The Pursuit of Happyness

The Pursuit of Happyness

Varèse Sarabande released the soundtrack on January 9, 2007, which included sixteen tracks.-Box office:The film debuted first at the North American box office, earning $27 million during its opening weekend and beating out heavily promoted films such as Eragon and Charlotte's Web...

.

The Carpenters

The Carpenters

Carpenters were an American vocal and instrumental duo, consisting of sister Karen and brother Richard Carpenter. The Carpenters were the #1 selling American music act of the 1970s. Though often referred to by the public as "The Carpenters", the duo's official name on authorized recordings and...

 version was released on their album Now & Then (1973), and performed on TV with Ella Fitzgerald

Ella Fitzgerald

Ella Jane Fitzgerald , also known as the "First Lady of Song" and "Lady Ella," was an American jazz and song vocalist...

, the medley in which it was sung was subsequently released on the compilation album As Time Goes By.

The band Widespread Panic

Widespread Panic

Widespread Panic is an American rock band from Athens, Georgia. The current lineup includes guitarist/singer John Bell, bassist Dave Schools, drummer Todd Nance, percussionist Domingo "Sunny" Ortiz, keyboardist John "JoJo" Hermann, and guitarist Jimmy Herring...

 opened their Austin, TX 2009 Halloween encore with "This Masquerade."

Ukrainian vocal band ManSound

ManSound

ManSound - is a vocal sextet, founded in 1994. ManSound has participated in over 50 jazz festivals, performed three times at the Layonella Hampton festival in the United States. The All American Entertainment Awards nominated ManSound as best vocal group in 2001. In 2002 ManSound won the Grand...

has recorded a trilogy starting with this song in the album "If It’s Magic", 2004.