PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?

Subject: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: dani
Date: 17 Dec 97 - 03:57 PM

Can you help me solve a puzzle? I remember the recent conversation about canons/rounds/two different songs sung at the same time. Is there a word for fitting lyrics from one song to the tune of another, and having an (almost) perfect fit?

The other day I heard someone do a haunting version of "O Little Town of Bethlehem" with her lovely voice and guitar. The words, were, of course, clearly familiar. The tune, vaguely so. Then it came to me... "The House of the Rising Sun". Try it! It works. But WHY??

Dani

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 17 Dec 97 - 04:26 PM

Elementary, My dear Watson. The meter matches. Maybe it's the same with Pink Floyd and the Wizard of Oz, or whatever it was they made such a stink about. In language, there are only certain meters that "work." Other rhythms just don't sound right to us, so we don't use them.
-Joe-

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Jon W.
Date: 17 Dec 97 - 05:12 PM

Our church hymnal even has an index of songs by meter for the purpose of singing the hymns to different tunes. But I don't believe "House of the Rising Sun" is in it!

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Alan of Australia
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 01:42 AM

G'day,
What about psalm 23 to the tune of "House of the Rising Sun"??

Cheers,
Alan

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Jack mostly folk
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 02:24 AM

Hi Mudcatters... I attended a song circle at Three Rivers Folklore Society Richland WA, and to my surprize there were a good number of words from other songs that fit House of the Risig Sun. Some were just plain goofy, but it was also a lot of fun. It was something I have'nt tried on my own. Iguess a real singer should give it a test run to any words like; There is a house in New Orleans,they call.......Nice thread dani Jack "mostly folk"

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Bert
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 11:09 AM

We used to force Nellie Dean fit the Marine's Hymn.

There's an old mill by the Stre-e-e-eem
Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean
Where we used to sit and dre-e-e-eem
Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean
and the waters as they flow-ow-ow
seem to murmur soft and low-ow-ow-ow
you're my heart's des-ire, I-I love you so-o
Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean, Nellie Dean

I also remember years ago you could get Square Dance records which consisted of just chord arrangements which could be used for many different singing calls.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Earl
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 02:38 PM

I once heard someone sing Sting's "Every Breath You Take" (or whatever) to the tune of Mississippi John Hurt's "Coffee Blues" ("that lovin spoonful"). It had the same effect as a Japanese cartoon.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Nonie Rider
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 03:06 PM

There's a gorgeous album by "Big Daddy," whoever they may be, that puts modern lyrics to 50s hit tunes.

The best, which fits so well it's hardly a parody, is Dire Straits' "Money for Nothing" to the tune of "Sixteen Tons."

"Welcome to the Jungle" fits pretty well into "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" too...

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Nonie Rider
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 03:13 PM

Combos are particularly popular in filk (the folk music of the science-fiction community), but for a lot of them, you'd need to know the source.

One of Robert A. Heinlein's short stories features a blind musician who dies heroically saving a spaceship from some problem in their atomic pile. Already fatally irradiated, he sings one last version of his most famous song, a sentimental paean to the home planet:

We pray for one last landing
On the globe that gave us birth;
Let us rest our eyes on the fleecy skies
And the cool green hills of Earth.

An amazing number of fans have written tunes for the thing, but the, um, definitive version was filked in the Midwest in the late 70s: the cad used the tune of "I'd like to teach the world to sing," and added the catchy chorus:

It's the real thing;
Earth is
What you're hoping to find
When you're reading Heinlein;
It's the real thing!

I've never heard anyone try it seriously since.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: dani
Date: 18 Dec 97 - 06:04 PM

Oh my, Earl. SPEAKING of the folk process. Are we there already, with the Japanese cartoons? I have an informal hobby of timing how long it takes for gross jokes to start the rounds after disasters of various sorts. This might be a record!

dani

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: alison
Date: 19 Dec 97 - 12:15 AM

Hi,

Speaking of hymns, we used to do "THere is a green hill far away" to the tune of "house of the rising sun."

Slainte

Alison

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Earl
Date: 19 Dec 97 - 01:15 PM

Dani, I try to stay current. These references also have a very short shelf-life.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Nonie Rider
Date: 19 Dec 97 - 01:55 PM

Emily Dickinson is widely known to scan well to "Gilligan's Island"...

Because I would not stop for death--
He kindly stopped for me--

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Jon W.
Date: 22 Dec 97 - 12:59 PM

The Prarie Home Companion book of folksongs (mentioned in folksong book thread) has a section on poems that scan to tunes such as Yankee Doodle, etc.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Tim
Date: 24 Dec 97 - 02:03 PM

The lyrics to the dreaded "Unicorn Song" sound great when sung to "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" - both songs are about boats, so it makes some sense.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Selene
Date: 24 Dec 97 - 02:13 PM

Well, the tune for "Oh my darling Clementine" has been used for a dutch scouting song, also sung in two parts called Onder Hele hoge bomen (under very high trees) and it's about pixie's! I didn't notice untill one of the leaders started singing Clementine, and I switched over halfway to onder hele hoge bomen! boy was I embarresed. I never really looked at it before, because I didn't consider a tune able to skip language. Be warned, it can.

Selene

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: Earl
Date: 24 Dec 97 - 03:29 PM

Tim, If we can just get it to include "Margaritaville" and "anthing by James Taylor" we can dispose of all requested songs at once.

Subject: RE: PUZZLE: lyrics under another cover?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 25 Dec 97 - 11:39 AM

If someone wants to take on a huge (but useful) job, It would be a great help to ethnomusicologists and scholars of folksong if a metrical listing were available for at least the traditional songs we know. Historically, many of the ballads were sung to melodies often associated with other ballads--with some, though, there were variants in meter---and the dates and sources for these variants can be a key element in tracing the ballad's history.

I've long been intrigues by how the "feel" of a song changes when you change the melody for one of the same meter: Try Clemintine to Deutschland Uber Alles, then to Babylon is Fallen, then to What a Friend We Have in Jesus and even to God Rest Ye, Merry Gentleman. To name but a few that fit.