The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #82196   Message #1505098
Posted By: YorkshireYankee
20-Jun-05 - 10:44 AM
Thread Name: Best songs to get people singing?
Subject: RE: Best songs to get people singing?
Hard Times Come Again No More (one of those songs everyone just seems to know)
Ain't Gonna Study War No More (aka "Down by the Riverside"), I Went Down to the Valley to Pray, (and other "zipper" songs)
A lot of people know John Denver songs (the choruses, anyway) without having consciously learned them: Country Roads, Annie's Song
Then there are the call & repeat songs like Sippin' Cider and The Other Day I Met a Bear
And songs with a refrain rather than (or in addition to) a chorus, like Gone, Gonna Rise Again, or Shut De Door, Keep Out De Devil
More Paxton: Ramblin' Boy, Home to Me is Anywhere You Are
Steve Goodman's City of New Orleans
If I Had a Hammer
Today (While the Blossoms Still Cling to the Vine)
Sweet Violets
Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head
Songs from Musicals (again, songs people don't necessarily know they know): Matchmaker, Hello Dolly, New York New York, Edelweiss, Lonely Goatherd; So Long, Farewell; Do-a Deer, Climb Every Mountain, I Feel Pretty, Maria, Tonight, There's a Place for Us, Clang Clang Clang Went the Trolley, Oklahoma, People will Say We're in Love, Oh What a Beautiful Mornin', I'm as Corny as Kansas in August, There is Nothing Like a Dame, Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair, 76 Trombones, I Love You a Bushel and a Peck, Luck Be a Lady Tonight, Only Doin' it for Some Doll, The Age of Aquarius, Hey Big Spender, When You Walk Through a Storm, etc...
WWI & WWII songs: Long Way to Tipperary, Pack Up Your Troubles, There'll be Blue Birds Over, Don't Sit Under the Apple Tree, Long Long Trail a Winding (here's a great WWI website to find (among other things) words to WWI songs that everyone knows the chorus to, but not many of the other words)
Also: Motown Songs, Beatles songs, Gospel songs, rounds, TV themes can be fun, too

Have fun!