As April 23 is the day that William Shakespeare died -- and is believed by many to be his birthday as well -- today's post looks at songs from the Billboard year-end Top 30 charts (1951-2015) that refer to the works of Shakespeare. A search of the collection in terms of character names, place names, and famous lines from found reference to only a single work attributed to Shakespeare: Romeo and Juliet. However, there are several references to this work, considered by many to be Shakespeare's most romantic play, in various songs from the collection, from the late 1970s to 2015. The videos for these songs are featured below (in chronological order).

http://PointerSistersTribute.com Ruth, Anita & June perform "Fire" live on the Midnight Special in 1979.

Deniece Williams' official music video for 'Let's Hear It For The Boy'.

Official video of Billy Idol performing Cradle Of Love from the album Charmed Life.

Always Live in LONDON 1995.

Official music video for 'I Can Love You Like That' by All-4-One 'twenty+' Out Now: http://radi.al/AFO20Standard Deluxe: http://radi.al/AFO20Deluxe Subscribe: http://radi.al/SubscribeAll4One Follow All-4-One: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/all4onepage Twitter: https://twitter.com/all_4_one Instagram: http://instagram.com/all4onemusic http://all-4-one.com

Download "Shut Up and Dance" on iTunes: http://smarturl.it/SUAD?Iqid=yt Download the new album "Talking Is Hard" on iTunes: http://smarturl.it/TalkingIsHardiT?IQid=yt Stream "Shut Up and Dance" on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/SUADSpotify?IQid=yt Music video by WALK THE MOON performing Shut Up and Dance. (C) 2014 RCA Records, a division of Sony Music Entertainment

And a couple of bonus tunes that include references to Romeo and Juliet but do not appear in the Billboard Top 30 collection:

The music video for Dire Straits' "Romeo and Juliet" from their album "Making Movies", released in 1980.

Bruce Frederick Joseph Springsteen (born September 23, 1949) is an American musician, singer, songwriter and humanitarian. He is best known for his work with his E Street Band.

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