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Songs We're Too Cool To Sing
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Subject: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Jun 05 - 03:58 PM Many years ago at a North Country Folk Festival in the northern penninsula of Michigan, I had a real treat. I was slotted in to a workshop titled "Songs We All Know But Are Too Cool To Sing." I thought that it was a great idea. Bordering on cool. I sang I've Been Working On The Railroad," but the real topper came from my friend Jerry Rau who sang ABCDEFG, and got everyone to sing along. Someone did On Top Of Old Smokey, from what I remember. It was a good reminder that our purpose in singing is NOT to look cool. Just because a song is overly familiar doesn't make you un-cool to sing it. In the reverse, I was amazed many years ago when I sang Blue Diamond Mines at a gathering in a home and someone else was furious with me. She had "discovered" the song (a little late as Jean Ritchie had already recorded it) and was angry that someone else was doing "her" song. I wonder if she thought it was alright for Jean to do it, as she was the one who wrote it.. Very uncool. So fess up.. what song would you do in the workshop? (Another strange workshop was simply titled "Out On A Limb." But that's another story..) Jerry Still uncool after all these years |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Joe Offer Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:02 PM I don't really think of myself as "cool," but even I am too cool to sing "Today" (Randy Sparks) - but I sing it anyhow because women like it. -Joe Offer- |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:03 PM Aha! Now we know the motivation for your singing, Joe. To get the chicks! Jerry |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Midchuck Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:04 PM I credit Ian Tyson, with his performance on his CD, "And Stood There Amazed," with convincing me that it was all right to sing "Home on the Range." Peter. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Wesley S Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:09 PM Rocky Mountain High and Blowing In The Wind |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Uncle_DaveO Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:12 PM "Eeentsy Weentsy Spider"???? Dave Oesterreich |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Charmion Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:17 PM If you're happy and you know it, don't clap your hands -- blow a razzberry! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Bee-dubya-ell Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:29 PM I draw the line at any song ever sung by a Care Bear. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Pseudolus Date: 21 Jun 05 - 04:59 PM Wait a minute, I have 20 month old sons, your naming all their favorites!!!! Frank P.S. ...uh, and they think I'm cool! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Chris in Wheaton Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:16 PM Mark Dvorak sings "What a Wonderful World" with pictures no less. But not It's a Small World, thank God. Mark aslo does Smile (Chaplin). Great guy, Mark is. Chris in Wheaton |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: PoppaGator Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:27 PM "Kumbaya" "Michael Row the Boat Ashore" "Scarlet Ribbons" Even in 1966/67, when I thought it was pretty cool to play and sing the above, they weren't really all that cool at all... |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Rapparee Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:39 PM "Little White Duck" and anything sung by Barney, the giant purple Zuccini. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: TheBigPinkLad Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:43 PM Jesus wants me for a sunbeam. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Le Scaramouche Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:46 PM I'll Tell Me Ma. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: DonMeixner Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:53 PM The Teddy Bears Picnic. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Jim Date: 21 Jun 05 - 05:53 PM Agree w/"Kumbaya" and "Michael, Row the Boat Ashore." How about "Wimoweh," "This Land is Your Land," "Dem Bones," "Skip to My Lou?" There are a bunch that have been done so much that its now 'uncool' to sing them. I'm usually immune to this, as I love to sing the old standards, but I have to admit that "Mary Ellen Carter" (which i once loved) is rapidly becoming unendurable. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: PoppaGator Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:20 PM DonMeixner: I've always liked "Teddy Bears' Picnic," and if it was good enough for Dave Van Ronk ~ a definitively cool individual ~ who else could possibly claim to be "above" it? GUEST,Jim: You agree with me on "Kumbaya" and "Michael, Row the Boat Ashore" but NOT my other nomination? I can only assume you are completely unfamiliar with the extremely cheesy quasi-folk pop song "Scarlet Ribbons." Well, it was my first fingerpicking piece, playing 6/8 arpeggios, three notes up and three notes down each measure. (I was very young, and not very cool at all.) |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Janie Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:25 PM Notice the overlap in songs in this thread and the thread "Songs to Get People Singing?" Janie:>) |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Peace Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:27 PM Silver Threads and Golden Needles On Top of Ol' Smoky Bicycle Built for Two |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,celtaddict at work Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:32 PM Pseudolus, welcome back; haven't seen you in t-o-o l-o-n-g. And congratulations on the youngsters (which likely explains why we haven't heard from you). |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,ClaireBear Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:41 PM Well, I always used to feel that way about "Oh Danny Boy," but my somewhat more financially astute/desperate partner amended my "It'll be a cold day in hell before we..." to "We'll only sing that one for a $20 tip." (By the way this was 1976, when $20 was a lot more than it is now.) Much to my surprise, we got the tip. (Actually I kind of recall that the guy gave us $50, but I could be misremembering that.) I developed a great fondness for Danny Boy that day! So...I respectfully suggest a hefty "hokey song surcharge" for such requests. Usually the requester will demur -- whoopee, then you don't have to sing it! -- but if they say yes, the financial incentive can handsomely offset any momentary lapse in coolness. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: michaelr Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:47 PM When Irish Eyes are Smiling I'll Take You Home Again Kathleen The Unicorn Song Claire -- I second the "hokey song surcharge". I've been heard to advise punters to write their request on the back of a $50 bill -- no one has yet taken me up on that. Cheers, Michael |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:52 PM The Wild Rover |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: breezy Date: 21 Jun 05 - 06:53 PM 'Athenry,' but I do it and it always works cos I treats it with respect. 'Zoo tomorrow' by T P, but I dont do it....yet Lts facit some of the songs mentioned are naff, but only cos I dont know the chords for Teddy Bear's Picnic I revived Blowing in the Wind cos not many of our youth know it and its still highly relevant as is Where Have all the Flowers Gone? bye |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: sixtieschick Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:00 PM I'm not cool, so it's not a problem. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: PoppaGator Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:26 PM RE: "Hokey Song Surcharge" For many years, this old and by-now-yellowed sign has been hanging in New Orleans' Preservation Hall, home to authentic classic ("Trad") jazz: Requests: $2 Traditional Requests: $1 "The Saints": $10 Keep in mind that we're talking pre-inflation 1960s dollars here. For traditonal jazz-band players, "When the Saints Go Marchin' In" is the single definitively un-cool piece. sixtieschick ~ Who are you trying to kid? You're absolutely cool! (I suppose not caring can only help one's coolness quotient...) |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Jim Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:31 PM PoppaGator: Well, I am only marginally familiar w/Scarlet Ribbons. I was only 5 years old in '64, so my standards of what was hokey were, perhaps, yet undeveloped. GUEST: |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Art Thieme Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:32 PM "Cool Water", "The Frozen Logger", "Cold Cold Heart", anything at all from Cool And The Gang, "Hannah", "The Frozen Charlotte", "On The Wild Moor"---many others. I hope you had a good birthday, Jerry. Art |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:33 PM Hey, Poppa: We are all so un-cool that we are the definition of cool. Too cool to be worried that we are un-cool. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: sixtieschick Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:41 PM Jivin' Jerry and da Big Poppa, I'm hip, daddy-O. Crazy man, crazy! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Sidewinder. Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:47 PM My least favourite song of all time is "In The Year 2525" by Zager and Evans and I have been fortunate in never hearing anyone, other than the aforementioned, perform the song.However, if I were to enter into a hostelry and hear some guitar playing goofball attempt to perform this travesty I would have to disembowel the unfortunate soul with his instrument. I myself refuse to perform anything by Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, Steeleye Dan,Uriah Heep,REO Speedwagon, Styx, Emerson Lake and the other one, Genesis and/or Phil Collins. Because "it don't move me".How anyone can rubbish a Woody Guthrie classic is beyond me!Refer to previous posting on that one. Regards. Sidewinder. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Jun 05 - 07:58 PM Gee sidewinder... I'm with you... I'm never tempted to do songs by any of the above. :-) Add I had a dog and his name was blue (which I still can enjoy singing, loving dogs and all. There's A Tavern in the Town is another one I still can sing. Birthday was fine, Art. Thanks. Your's is coming up, in case no one else has noticed yet. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Sidewinder. Date: 21 Jun 05 - 08:32 PM Thank you for your kind words Jerry and keep up the good work. Best Wishes. Sidewinder. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Stephen R. Date: 21 Jun 05 - 08:50 PM "Happy Birthday to you" "Jingle Bells" Anyone remember "How much is that doggy in the window?"? Generally, the more people that know it, the less cool, I suppose. I'm happy to say that I don't hear "Mary Ellen Carter" often enough to be tired of it. (To my fellow Orthodox: I won't discuss the way Russians sing troparia of Tone 4, which includes the great majority of festal troparia, other than to ask: Why not a tune?) Stephen |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Uncle_DaveO Date: 21 Jun 05 - 09:33 PM To the contrary of Art's preferences, I love The Frozen Logger, and I confess that I sing it too much. Many years ago, when I was young and callow, my brother's 10 kids, who constituted my biggest (in size and frequency and enthusiasm) audience, when I'd sing for them for two and three hours at a time, would request certain songs over and over and over and over and--well, you get the idea. As a result, for many years thereafter I couldn't bring myself to sing Big Rock Candy Mountain or Froggie Went A-Courtin'. Only of recent times, after a lapse of (what? 45 years?) am I able to sing those songs again. Dave Oesterreich |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: sixtieschick Date: 21 Jun 05 - 10:28 PM There's also "Cool" from West Side Story, and "Cool Water" by the Beach Boys, containing the immortal lines, In an ocean or in a glass Cool water is such a gas |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,.gargoyle Date: 21 Jun 05 - 10:47 PM HAPPY BIRTHDAY (standard American version)
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: DonMeixner Date: 21 Jun 05 - 11:35 PM Nuts! I don't know what brain drain I was sucked into. I completely miss read this thread. I still do "Teddy Bears Picnic", usually at the drop of a hat, or no hat at all. I guess I'm not too cool at all then. I won't do "The Voyage" or "The Old Man" unless I'm paid to and then I still bitch about it. Maybe I'm too cool to do "Honey" for straight. Don |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: PoppaGator Date: 22 Jun 05 - 01:28 AM Gawd, I hope you're too cool to sing "Honey" with a sraight face! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Matt_R Date: 22 Jun 05 - 02:58 AM Cast's arrangement of "Auld Lang Syne" Oh yeah The Beach Boys' "Cool Water" is awesome, as is all of Surf's Up. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Dave Hanson Date: 22 Jun 05 - 03:45 AM If ' The Teddy Bears Picnic ' was cool enough for the late Jerry Garcia........it's COOL eric |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST Date: 22 Jun 05 - 03:46 AM Oh no, the Fields of Athenry, If I hear it one more time I think I'll cry |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Kaleea Date: 22 Jun 05 - 05:39 AM I most definately remember "Scarlet Ribbons" as it was one of my alltime favs when I was a little girl. Nobody is too cool to sing Hank Williams! Think you're too cool to sing . . . Rubber Duckie (a vodie oh doh!) Jeff Moss sold over a million copies of this hit single! The chairman of the board (MISTER Sinatra to you) sang: "It's Not Easy Being Green" also from Sesame Street |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Crystal Date: 22 Jun 05 - 06:07 AM She'll be conin' round the mountain Plus any other verses to the same tune, clean or not! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: jacqui.c Date: 22 Jun 05 - 06:57 AM Scarlet Ribbons is a great song and so is Silver Threads. I think I've got too old to worry about cool. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: Janie Date: 22 Jun 05 - 08:08 AM I'm with you, Jacqui! And when I was young enough to worry about cool, I never seemed to "get it" anyway! Janie who was a nerd before the word was invented. |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: An Englishman Abroad Date: 22 Jun 05 - 08:16 AM We must be that cool we are frozen here in Columbus Ohio. I'll Tell Me Ma. Fields of Athenry 'Zoo tomorrow' The Wild Rover Mary Ellen Carter all regular parts of sets in this area. Makes me think we are in the backwoods. Must admit to doing a stupid version of Streets of Laredo all the best John |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Bob Coltman Date: 22 Jun 05 - 08:36 AM All the silly songs from camp, from A Is for Aardvark to Ye Cannae Push Yer Granny Off a Bus. I did the big turnaround and made a collection of the things, Baby Owlet, Itsy Bitsy, Floating Down the Delaware, Gopher Guts, Mister Moon Moon Moon, etc. etc. Wretched once, but now I love 'em. Many of the Burl Ives "standards" from before we all discovered Authenticity. Some have already been mentioned. You know...Molly Malone...Blue Tail Fly...hundreds. The whole contents of the Burl Ives Songbook, Burl Ives Sea Songs, etc. And they're wonderful songs! Spider John Koerner was one who early on said, Hey, these songs are great. Casey Jones...sing it. Cindy...sing it. Aunt Rhody...sing it. The Fox? Sure. (And better and slower than Nickel Creek, too.) That was liberating for me. I could reclaim what is, after all, our common folk heritage, even if ol' Burl did sing it to death. I sing whatever song I like now, familiar or unheard-of, and I'm usually able to hear them all as if for the first time. (But then, some people would say I never did have any taste.) Bob |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: harpgirl Date: 22 Jun 05 - 08:39 AM If it's not too cool for Bob Coltman, it's not too cool for me! |
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Subject: RE: Songs We're Too Cool To Sing From: GUEST,Gadaffi Date: 22 Jun 05 - 09:16 AM In the late 1970s/early 1980s, thanks to the Bracknell Folk Festival's (aka Handsome Mouldiwarp) policy of finishing the Saturday night with a 'Rough Music' session where each artiste had to do something 'they wouldn't normally do/have never done' in their act. Remarkable performances ensued. Similar sorts of recitals were tried at local folk clubs. At Fleet, I recall Maggie Holland singing 'Streets of London', Rebecca Over performing 'Where Have All the Flowers Gone', with myself responding with Chuck Berry's 'My Ting-a-Ling'. Public decency and poor memory denies me passing on what other appalling ditties were performed that evening although I shall doubtless be racking my brain on the train home later today! |
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