Beautiful song, perhaps made most famous for its appearance in the mob movie classic, Goodfellas. In Scorcese’s 1990 epic, Jerry Vale himself serenades the titular crew alongside their ‘goomahs’ at the Copa Cabana club with this very ballad.

The song’s meaning is simple enough to grasp. A forlorn admirer speaks to himself (or his ‘heart’) when confronted with seeing the lady of his affections in public. He recognizes that it’s too late to turn away and leave without causing a scene, and so steels himself by pretending to not see her. His repeated longing pleas to ‘pretend you don’t love her’ reinforce what a difficult task this is, leaving us (the listener) in no doubt as to the depths of his feelings towards this lady.