Category Archives: Songs

Songs

A Song That Sums It All Up

68 Comments

Baboons provided an eye-opening discussion yesterday on the topic of whether or not they would want to be immortal. If you haven’t read the comments, take a look.

My assessment – mixed feelings though a clear majority of the group voted “No”!

There were some wafflers, mostly conflicted over the trade-offs and what else might come along as part of the immortality bargain. After all, living forever is a whole lot more attractive if it comes with a guarantee that your eternity will be spent healthy and pain-free.

And then Steve posted this comment …

… which made me think of a song by Harry Nilsson that has been a favorite since I first heard it when I was 18 years old. Nilsson recorded the song with a boisterous chorus of senior citizens singing along with a piano, an accordion and a tuba.

I often wondered as I listened to the song how those old people really felt about the lyrics – after all, “I’d Rather Be Dead (Than Wet My Bed)” is a rather cheeky sentiment to put in the mouths of octogenarians. Then I found this clip from a Nilsson documentary on You Tube and learned the amazing secret of making the session enjoyable for everyone – a new suit for Harry, and lots of sherry for everyone else!

Name a song you would have to be drunk to sing in public.

Songs

HB, RN

65 Comments

I’m a Randy Newman fan, and today is his birthday.
It’s a good reason to spend too much time online listening to amazing songs with wonderfully catchy piano riffs, like this one.

http://youtu.be/9jiLL2d-alc

Newman writes about religion more than any songwriter I know, and with more nuance than anyone who addresses the topic, period. All in just over three minutes.

http://youtu.be/vEKuGcmW70I

But lest you think Randy Newman blames God for all our problems, here’s one where he makes a point of NOT pointing a finger heavenward.

http://youtu.be/7SKGIwsXuA0

Newman’s song about his upbringing in L.A. And New Orleans is called Dixie Flyer, after a train linking the cities.

What name would you give to a song about your childhood?

Songs, The Baboon Congress

Will You Marry Me?

77 Comments

Today’s guest post comes from Beth-Ann.

When my son was young we were at Como Park and as happens on many sunny Saturdays there was a wedding party posing for photographs. It was a large Filipino family wearing flouncy dresses and elegant tuxes. The bride’s dress was layers and layers of white lace with a long train.

My son turned to me and said, “Now I know why you never got married. ”

I was interested in his analysis and asked him why.

His preschooler answer was, “That dress looks awfully itchy. You wouldn’t want to wear it.”

I think my unmarried state is related to more complex social interactions, and because Prince Charming never showed with ring in hand to propose.  But my son was right, that dress did look itchy.  With all the talk surrounding the marriage amendment I’ve recently been revisiting the question of why people get married and why at a time when the divorce rate is reported to be 50% do same sex couples in this country want so desperately to follow suit?

I think we’re past the time when women married for economic security. Similarly, all sorts of statistics and observations confirm that few people wait until marriage to have sex. Many couples don’t even wait until marriage to have kids. So if the sociological and natural law descriptions that marriage is for breeding and money/survival no longer apply, what’s the allure?

Some of the most heartfelt words about marriage these days seem to come from members of the gay community who in most states are denied the chance to marry. Two young Minnesotan men wrote the following:

On May 22nd we were married in the chapel. Surrounded by nearly 200 friends and family, in the presence of God, we made sacred vows to love and honor one another in sickness and in health, when times are good and when things get tough. We made a public promise of responsibility for each other and asked our loved ones to support us and hold us accountable. We married for the same reasons heterosexuals couples marry: To make a lifetime commitment to the one we love in the presence of our friends and family; to share the joys and sorrows that life brings; to be a family, and to be able to protect that family.

This ideal is reflected in a video posted by the local duo Neal and Leandra.

For those who have the legal right to do it, getting married is the easy part (itchy dress notwithstanding). Staying together appears to be the bigger challenge.

How and why do people stay married?

Songs, The Baboon Congress

koo?

60 Comments

Today’s guest post comes from tim.

the igsnats is raggled and sort of bedraggled and ferbuffing aballa chome
but just as she twizzled the homdong bedrizzled yo wassled im baxters liloam

it’s maxish ro traxish sel codee bulaxes faranda buttu or benigh
this eeps quite bittully lets not get unruly, erick and betook and oligh

ley boonk the bitussal because its refusal will dibble the gartz quite aboonly
if carblish is true then bortookly ri blue is the obvious ash to the junetree

i fear that nuressel quips inside my vessel and higgles to felton arral
if westleward ginkles leave bitelshear sprinkles amid levelosh divinthol

a quasterly mumfly domes flamen tumumkly emfatably worsle benee
ip waller gnishby sees more of the kish he rekembles his farberly wee

Do you ever have your warble go koo?

Poems, Songs

John Barleycorn Must DNA

71 Comments

Barley made the news yesterday, in part thanks to a Minnesota scientist. Professor Gary Muehlbauer of the Department of Agronomy and Plant Genetics at the University of Minnesota and a cadre of international researchers managed to sequence the genome for barley, said to be “one of the world’s most important and genetically complex cereal crops“. Results were published in the journal Nature. Apparently this work could lead to higher barley yields, better resistance to pests, and enhanced nutritional value. It may also help barley adapt to the stresses of climate change.

You know what that means – we can trash the environment and still have beer!

Congratulations to the researchers. A round for all my genome sequencing friends! It made me think of this old song about barley and its role in the beer and whiskey making process. Sung here by Martin Carthy.

The scientists have done their best
employing all their means
They found out, using every test,
John Barleycorn has genes!

They chopped him up so very small
and put him on display.
Tore him apart to see it all
and mapped his DNA.

If you were him by now you’d know
the sum of all your parts.
What makes you wilt. What helps you grow.
The compounds in your farts.

The sequence tells us who he is,
of what he is composed.
His elements, his spark, his fizz.
John Barleycorn, exposed.

Would you want to have a map of your DNA?

Songs

Trying to Stay on Track

76 Comments

Hearing the kerfuffle about Mitt Romney’s comments at a supposedly private fundraiser about the freeloading 47%, I was reminded of this ballad about a train wreck. The Wreck of the Old 97 is something that really happened back in late September of 1903. An engineer, Steve Broady, was urged by his superiors to get the mail delivered on time even though he was well behind schedule. The results were disastrous.

Every political candidate who has handlers is constantly under pressure to stay “on message”, even if it means following a rather narrow track. I can only imagine how tempting it is to simply push the throttle forward and feel the wind tousle your beautiful hair!

Here’s the original version of The Wreck of the Old 97.

Well they fed him the numbers for his target percentage
sayin’ “don’t speak this out loud.”
But you can never appeal to the frail 47
They’re a whiney liberal crowd.

So he turned around and said to his hoity toity funders
“We can win it with 53
If we pick up every voter between Lynchburg and Danville
that’s including you and me”

There was someone in the crowd taking pictures with a camera
of the whole off-record speech.
Then he posted it online just to cause a lot of trouble
What a lazy, shiftless leech!

So they backpedaled all day. Every interview on cable
started with that thing he said.
About victims and entitlements and living on the dole
and how cheesecake is not like bread.

So now all you politicians better keep on your message
’til your eyeballs start to burn.
Never say another word about the pampered 47
or your older tax returns.

When have you become completely derailed?

Songs

Some Songs by Steve Goodman

134 Comments

Today would have been the 64th birthday of the Chicago singer and songwriter Steve Goodman. Not that we need a reason to spend some time listening to him, but any excuse is good enough to detour into the Goodman archive.

Steve Goodman was born in 1948 and only made it to age 36, but what an amazing accomplishment that was when you consider that he was diagnosed with leukemia at age 20 and fought through the illness and fatigue to make such a lasting impression. It could not have been easy to project the kind of energy and enthusiasm he did through all the pain and discomfort that comes with the disease.

He did it with his pen, writing a song that by now has been in the world longer than he ever was – “The City of New Orleans.” It will still be here after all of us are gone.

http://youtu.be/AJ0JgqoF2W4

Steve Goodman also amazed with his abilities as an interpreter. This is his version of Michael Smith’s song “The Dutchman.” It’s also a treat to watch for the clearly loving and respectful interplay with the great Jethro Burns.

And Steve Goodman wowed us with his dexterity and good humor on old standards you wouldn’t expect a folk singer to attempt.

http://youtu.be/dB2iF6h_PMs

Steve Goodman was a funny, inspiring and entertaining fellow. And he still is. After they are gone, the world mourns musicians in varying degrees – mostly in proportion to their record sales. I know people who are still broken up about the loss of Elvis, Michael Jackson, Whitney Houston, Buddy Holly – great talents all. The size of their following doesn’t matter as much as they way they connected – like all music it’s still a matter of individual taste and it becomes a rather senseless exercise to contrast and compare.

But if I could bring back one musician from among the legions who left too soon, I think I’d most enjoy hearing more from Steve Goodman.

You have the power to resurrect the singer of your choice. Who?

Songs

The Wedding Dance

77 Comments

Here is a tricky social situation, just right for navigation by sensitive baboons. The note comes from Jane Beauchamp – a former Morning Show listener, sometime Trial Baboon reader and permanently proud mother who is about to have an FTD moment.

FTD in this case means “Forced To Dance.”

My son is 24 years old and marrying his high school sweetheart in an outdoor garden ceremony July 21 at a local country club to which her parents belong. He’s my oldest and the first of any of his friends to get married. I’ve not been very involved in the planning but it appears that it will be an elegant affair; a champagne reception and formal dinner follows the ceremony, after which the dance begins.

The challenge, then, is to come up with exactly the right piece of music to make the obligatory mother/son wedding dance both memorable and painless.

My son and I agree that a) neither of us are great dancers of any genre and b) we do not want anything that is very sentimental/syrupy/pop culture type of thing that would leave his mother (me) weeping in a heap on the dance floor. In fact, if we could avoid the whole dance thing that would probably be better, but I’ve been advised that isn’t part of the program for the evening, and, honestly, I would likely regret it if we didn’t do it.

What is the solution? Jane says the tune should be “something classic but/and fun; short vs. many verses is better; and beyond that we’re open.” Here’s a little more background to help guide you as you sift through your musical back stacks.

When my boys were growing up, we’d listen to The Morning Show every morning on the way to school. I like many other of your listeners told them it was my way of supporting a part of their music education. It was my only chance music-wise, as they both are very competitive athletes and that’s where their interests were. The son getting married played high school and college soccer; since finishing college, he’s been in sales for a national insurance company and loves the different type of competition he experiences there. He and his fiance have a small dog, Jolie, who they love to pieces, and when they’re not planning their wedding they like to travel (France, US, Mexico) and cook.

Stories? Suggestions? Songs?

Songs

Reef Raff

62 Comments

We have already heard that microscopic organisms outnumber us in a global scale and live in and on our bodies in places so private it would make us blanch if we could see them languishing there. This sure knowledge has made it easy for me to willfully ignore every new and breathless description that urges me to marvel at how we teem with unseen life.

I simply can’t afford to comprehend it.

True awareness of exactly how many tiny monsters I harbor would trigger an “Ish Factor” reaction that would be personally catastrophic. And yet it appears we are bound to know, regardless. Researchers now say the number of hangers-on is something on the order of 100 Trillion.

The good news – it’s a functioning community. Everyone hosts a distinct “microbiome” that may help determine what diseases you get and which ones you’re able to fight off. Be kind to your friendly neighborhood bacteria – they surround you. Maybe that’s the real “cloud of witnesses” following us around in Hebrews 12:1 – not dead predecessors, but very alive hitchhikers.

But these are the lines that stood out for me inside a New York Times article:

Dr. Barnett Kramer, director of the division of cancer prevention at the National Cancer Institute, who was not involved with the research project, had another image. Humans, he said, in some sense are made mostly of microbes. From the standpoint of our microbiome, he added, “we may just serve as packaging.”

“Humans”, said Dr. David Relman, a Stanford microbiologist, are like coral, “an assemblage of life-forms living together.”

I have never thought of myself as a walking sack of microbial congregations, and certainly not as a coral reef.

I guess when Simon and Garfunkel sang “I Am A Rock”, they were right about being an island and a fortress. But they were wrong about being alone.

How do you get along with the residents of your microbiome?

Songs, Uncategorized

The Foggy Foggy Dew

125 Comments

Today is the birthday of Burl Ives, the round, bearded, pipe-smoking, banjo-playing folk singer immortalized in claymation as a balladeer for the 1960’s TV special “Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer.” He was also blacklisted in the 50’s and snubbed for a time afterwards for keeping his career going by testifying before the House Un-American Activities Committee.

My favorite thing about Burl Ives is that he was an itinerant folk singer during the Depression, and got arrested in Utah for singing the song “Foggy Foggy Dew” in public on the grounds that it was a bawdy song. This, in spite of the fact that no one could pin down exactly what the term “Foggy Foggy Dew” meant. Some suggestions – Tuberculosis, Virginity, Being Sent to a Nunnery, and of course, Bad Weather.

This is an infectious little tune and there are multiple versions. It is uncommonly friendly to finagling via the folk process. So in keeping with our Theme of the Week, I’ll adapt it to fit one of the more arduous tasks of my youth.

When I was a juvenile I lived with my folks
And a hungry St. Bernard.
And the only, only thing that I sang was this song
As I walked around the yard.
I walked there in the wintertime
And in the summer too.
And the only, only thing that I did all day long
Was to pick up all the Doggy Doggy Doo

One night the hound came too my rooms
Her whimpers left no doubt.
She’d stolen a whole box of prunes
And needed to go out.
She yipped, she skipped, she nearly flipped
So what else could I do?
I leapt out of the sack and I let her go out back
And she filled it up with Doggy Doggy Doo.

Now I’m older than I was and I live with my son
And a different St. Bernard.
And every single time that the dog is in the house
The kitchen has a cupboard guard.
We lock it up in wintertime
And in the summer too
And all the fibered food is protected by alarms
Just to cut down on that Doggy Doggy Doo

What chore do you despise most?