Origins: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?

Subject: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: John M.
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 03:07 PM

Hello everyone,

Below is a traditional song titled: "Bebopping Jesus"   ( recording )

              1.  Do you sing this song? 
              2.  If yes, when and where did you learn it?
              3.  Would you be willing to sing it for folklore purposes over the phone?

Any help is appreciated.

Sincerely,

John Mehlberg
[e-mail]
~
Afternoons:  314.647.3883
Evenings:     314.381.0492
~
My website: www.immortalia.com
~

BE-BOPPING JESUS       ( recording )
(Tune - Be-Bop-A-Lula)

Beboppin' Jesus
He's my Savior.
Beboppin' Jesus
Don't mean maybe.
Beboppin' Jesus
He's my Savior now.
My Savior now
My Savior now
My Savior now.


Notes:  This was collected from an anonymous woman who learned it while an undergraduate at Purdue University in ~1962.  She was hanging around an irreverent crowd and learned this song along with a few others like "Plastic Jesus" and "Jesus was a Teenager, Too".  Richard Reuss in his "Analytical Survey of College Songs from Oral Tradition" as two versions of this song collected at Indiana University at in 1961 and 1963.

If you sing a version of this song, I would really like to hear from you so please feel free to email me: [e-mail]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: John M.
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 03:13 PM

Sorry about the bad link.  You can listen to the recording here.

• Field Recording - John Mehlberg Collection - See Notes.
  • Digital Recording - Anonymous - 2005.04.18
    • Be-boppin' Jesus, He's My Savior Now  Time: 0:15

Subject: Add: Bebopping Jesus, He's My Savior Now
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 03:45 PM

May have to learn that one for church, John.

~S~

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 09:55 PM

I sometimes sing it in the shower, for fun. The way I learned it, the fourth line is

          "I watch my behaviour."

I learned it in high school in Texas in the early 60's. No one ever mentioned a source.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: frogprince
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 10:34 PM

Probably the most offensive song parody I've ever heard (Thirty years ago, from a fellow seminarian):

Jesus loves the little children;
all the little children of the world;
niggers, kikes, and spics, and wops,
Jesus thinks they all are tops;
Jesus loves the little children of the world.

No, Susan, I won't expect you to sing it in church...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Haruo
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 11:05 PM

There's an even worse one ("Jesus loves the little children" parody, that is) where the implication is Jesus is a cannibal who loves the little children prepared in various ways. Don't remember how it goes. Probably will wish I never mentioned it.

Haruo
Baptist

PS I don't find "Bebopping Jesus" offensive, though I can't imagine singing it in church myself. Certainly no moreso than my "Allah (God)'s Chillun's Got Wings"...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: frogprince
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 11:15 PM

No, nothing really nasty about "Bebopping Jesus"; I could believe
someone teaching it to little kids. Reminds me a little of "Jesus
Loves Me, This I Know" as I heard it set to a very "rockin'" tune some a few years ago.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: John M.
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 11:38 PM

frogprince, not *all* of the songs which interest me are bawdy or offensive. I am just trying to find others who sing this song and find variants, if any.

"Plastic Jesus" was considered very offensive by some (and irreverant by many) when first published in the 1960s.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: frogprince
Date: 25 Jun 05 - 11:46 PM

Can't imagine who wouldn't consider "Plastic Jesus" IRREVERANT; I'm sure plenty of people freaked out, instead of "getting it", and took it as offensive and actually sacriligious. Irreverant don't bother me none; "offensive" is such a ball of wax about context and intention that I would hardly know where to start.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Haruo
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 12:01 AM

I'm still hoping someday to find (or create) the rest of the lyrics to "Plastic Zamenhof". (The part I know I learned in Portland OR in 1972, FWIW.) But that's off-topic.

I don't sing "Bebopping Jesus" but it does sound rather familiar, and I have either heard it before or heard different lyrics to the same tune.

Haruo

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Severn
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 02:46 AM

.....Red or yellow, black or white
They are tasty, every bite!
Jesus loves the little children of the world
(Yum Yum!)

Is that the one, Haruo?

Another one from early childhood to top that, if only as sauce or one of The Ten Condiments(as "Chilluns" Con Queso, I guess). Something about:

....The little Lard Cheese Whiz lay down his cheese spread
I love thee Lard Cheese Whiz, come down in disguise
and lay on my table by burgers and fries.

(The first line ended with "bread")

Your Friend In Cheeses,
Severn

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 09:32 AM

Bebopping Jesus may sound familiar because it's a very close take off on Beboppa Lula, She's My Baby.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this so
From: Haruo
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 12:33 PM

Severn, I think you got it, and topped it. The Cheez Whiz piece (do you know the incipit?) is a very neat travesty of the Eucharist, at the opposite end of such things from Stranger in a Strange Land.

And misophist, I'm inclined to think that you got it, too.

Haruo

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Amos
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 12:40 PM

When I was young and iconoclastic, I used to sing a similar rock/blues number that went like this (for historical interest only):

Virgin Mary sitting on a pile o' sticks
Said look out kid, I need a bad fix
Look out kid, I need a bad fix
If you can't find a needle, use a crucifix!

Rocking Jesus -- bop! bop!
Rocking Jesus -- bop! bop!
We're gonna pass around that communion wine
Rock around the cross, have a real high time
Rockin' Jesus.

(That's all I know of it and I have no idea where I learned it....)


A

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Severn
Date: 26 Jun 05 - 03:02 PM

Haruo,

I don't remember all of the first line, but it ended with "on slices of bread"

For lack of remembering the original first line, I made up:

"All lazy and mangy, unkempt and ill-bred"

at a later time in order to sing it, but you'll have to fill in your own first part or wait for someone to post the real one.

Severn

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 03 Jul 05 - 02:42 PM

Are you suggesting that Mudcat could use casino money to fix its problems?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: GUEST,Don Birdseye
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 06:54 PM

Don Birdseye

I don't know what possessed me to do a Google search for Be-Bopping Jesus, but I came across your web page and had to respond.

My name is Don Birdseye. I attended Harpur College (now Binghamton University) 1965-7, until I flunked out and went into the Army. In my final semester, I roomed with Denis Abrams and Bob Sweeney in a very cheap apartment (now a CVS Pharmacy parking lot) on Pennsylvania Avenue in Binghamton, NY. We all smoked pot and drank a lot of alcohol.

Be-Boppin' Jesus was the brainchild of Denis, but all three of us contributed lyrics, and I played a 3-chord blues guitar behind it. Whenever we had a party (which was often), sometime during the night the guitar would come out, and we'd break into Be-Boppin' Jesus. To my recollection, the only time we did the song outside the confines of #44 Pennsylvania Ave was at a party that Denis's then-girlfriend Liz Hoest threw for me at her home in Huntington, Long Island just before I went into the service ... her father loved it!

Some of the lyrics:

Be-Boppin' Jesus he's my savior
Be-Boppin' Jesus born in a manger
Be-Boppin' Jesus walks on the water
Be-Boppin' Jesus ain't got no father
Be-Boppin' Jesus, he's my savior now, my savior now, my savior now

Be-Boppin' Jesus he's my lord
Got crossed up on his college boards

Be-Boppin' Jesus don't want your blood
Next time you throw a supper, bring some Bud

Mary and Joseph were off in the woods
"Joseph", said Mary, "You're up to no good"

I hope this helps.
Don Birdseye

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: GUEST,keberoxu
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 12:18 PM

For some reason this brings to mind
Bebop Baby sung by right-wing Christian performer Pat Boone . . .

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: 'Bebopping Jesus' Do you sing this song?
From: and e
Date: 20 May 23 - 06:41 PM

ROCKIN' JESUS and/or BE-BOPPIN' JESUS

Choruses:

Rockin' Jesus (Yea, yea, yea)
Rockin' Jesus (Yea, yea, yea)
I don't know who is my favorite Jew
Rockin' Jesus (Yea, yea, yea)

or

Be-boppin' Jesus, he's my savior
Be-boppin' Jesus, I'm gonna watch my behavior
Be-boppin' Jesus, you ain't no friend of mine.

1) His hands were nailed, His feet were tied.
Oh my God he was crucified,

2) The Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost
All got together for a wiener roast,

3) I don't care if it rains or freezes
As long as I've got my plastic Jesus

4) Virgin Mary, she's the most
She got laid by the Holy Ghost

From "'DIRTY'" SONGS collected at the University of Maine" by Stephen Files, dated April, 1969.

See online here:

https://library.umaine.edu/content/NAFOH/text/NA0502.pdf