Many are familiar with the “exotic tune of the middle east.”

In A minor:

ABCBAABCGBCA

Perhaps, with lyrics like “There's a place in France where the women wear no pants.”

Its roots are in the Chicago “Columbian Exposition of 1895.”

In 1889, Sol Bloom (19 y.o.) acquired the rights for all future displays of the Algerian Village buildings and residents from the Paris exposition. (p 133)

His Algerians arrived a year earlier than contracted, and Bloom opened his village in August 1892. The “belly dance” danse du ventre , with rumors of half-clad women jiggling away, “had the crowds pouring in, Bloom said. “I had a gold mine.”

The Press Club of Chicago invited him to present a preview of dance to its members. On arrival he found a lone piano player with no idea of how to accompany the exotic dance.

Bloom thought, hummed, and then plunked out the immortal notes.

“Over the next century this tune and it variations would be deployed in a succession of mostly cheesy movies, typically as an accompaniment to the sinuous emergence of a cobra from a basket. I would also drive the schoolyard lyric,

And they wear no pants in the southern part of France.”

“Bloom regretted his failure to copyright the tune. The royalties would have run into the millions.” (pp208-209)

Larson, Erik, “The Devil in the White City – murder, magic and madness at the fair changed America,” Crown Publishers- New York, 2003.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Not in the DT - but perhaps should be.