Origins: Beans in my Ears (Len Chandler)

Subject: Beans in my Ears?
From:
Date: 22 Feb 98 - 09:26 AM

...or Beans in Your Ears. A folky, kiddy song from 50's or 60's. I remember hearing it when I was a kid but I don't recall any of the rest of the words. Any help out there?

Subject: Lyr Add: BEANS IN MY EARS^^
From: Gwenzilla
Date: 22 Feb 98 - 11:09 AM

My mommy said not to put beans in my ears,
Beans in my ears, beans in my ears.
My mommy said not to put beans in my ears,
Beans in my ears.

You can't hear your teacher with Beans in your ears (etc)

You can't hear your parents with (etc)

Hey, Charlie, let's go and put (etc.)

Hey, Mommy, we've gone and put (etc.)

That's nice son, just don't put those (etc.)

I think that all grownups have (etc.)

Those are all the verses I remember. :)
Zilla^^

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Shula
Date: 22 Feb 98 - 05:39 PM

Dear Raj,

Though not folk, same theme with much more clever lyrics: "Never Say No," (AKA,"Why Did The Kids Put Beans In Their Ears?"), from the musical, THE FANTASTICS.

Shalom,

Shula

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Gene
Date: 23 Feb 98 - 01:32 AM

I have an 8TRACK recording of that song from about 1960.....saw it last year, somewhere, have to dig it out...

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Feb 98 - 01:51 AM

The Rise Up Singing songbook attributes this song to Len H. Chandler, copyright 1964. The book has a few verses we have fun with in our song circle:

Hey, Charlie, let's go and put beans in our ears....
WHAT'S THAT YOU SAY? (2nd child)Let's put beans...
YOU'LL HAVE TO SPEAK UP, I'VE GOT BEANS IN MY HEARS...

30 people shouting those lines makes a pretty impressive racket.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Helen
Date: 23 Feb 98 - 06:06 AM

Gwenzilla,

Would that be *the* Gwenzilla of Harp Mailing List fame?

If so, hi there, from Helen in Australia, nice to see you here at Mudcat.

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Gene
Date: 23 Feb 98 - 01:31 PM

You're right, Joe! that was a TYPO above...make it 1970 vs 1960!

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: rich r
Date: 23 Feb 98 - 06:53 PM

My favorite verse to that song is the one Pete Seeger used with some regualarity around 1967-68.

This verse was for Mrs. Jay's little son, Albie.

I think Albie Jay has beans in his ears etc.

rich r

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Dawn
Date: 24 Feb 98 - 12:33 AM

I've heard another verse, after "My Mother said not to put beans in my ears....." that went "Why would I want to put beans in my ears...." and then to "Charlie, let's go put beans in our ears...."

Makes you wonder what its safe to tell your kids NOT to do!

Subject: ADD: Beans in my Ears ^^
From: Gene
Date: 16 Sep 98 - 03:59 PM

Here is one version of Beans In My Ears.
BEANS IN MY EARS
Singer/writer information not listed on LP

My mommy said not to put beans in my ears!
Beans in my ears! Beans in my ears!
My mommy said not to put beans in my ears!
B-E-A-N-S in my ears!

Now why would I want to put beans in my ears?
Beans in my ears! Beans in my ears!
Now why would I want to put beans in my ears?
B-E-A-N-S in my ears!

You can't hear the teacher with beans in your ears!
Beans in your ears! Beans in your ears!
You can't hear the teacher with beans in your ears!
B-E-A-N-S in your ears!

What's that, you say, let's put beans in our ears!?
Beans in our ears? Beans in our ears!
What's that you say, let's put beans in our ears!?
B-E-A-N-S in our ears!

You'll have to speak up, I've got beans in my ears!
Beans in your ears? Beans in my ears!
You'll have to speak up, I've got beans in my ears!
B-E-A-N-S in her ears!

Hey, mommy we've gone and put beans in our ears!
Beans in our ears! Beans in our ears!
Hey, mommy we've gone and put beans in our ears!
B-E-A-N-S in our ears!

That's nice, boys, just don't put those beans in your ears!
Beans in our ears! Beans in our ears!
That's nice, boys, just don't put those beans in your ears!
B-E-A-N-S in our ears!

I think that all grownups have beans in their ears!
Beans in their ears! Beans in their ears!
I think that all grownups have beans in their ears!
B-E-A-N-S in their ears!

SOURCE:
HOOTENANNY AND AMERICAN BALLADS
Modern Sound MS-543
^^

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 17 Sep 98 - 02:10 AM

The "Rise Up Singing" songbook says the song was copyrighted in 1964 by Len H. Chandler, Jr., and says: "Chandler states that he has the distinction of being the only songwriter in history to have his song publicly banned by the New York Board of Health.
It's on a very nice Mercury CD called "The Best of the Serendipity Singers."
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: gargoyle
Date: 19 Sep 98 - 11:57 AM

My fifth grade teacher, Miss Cromwell, repeatedly used the following expression through the school year.

Why do the children pour molasses on the dog,
When I specifically told them not to put molasses on the dog?

Why do the children put beans in their ears,
When I specifically told them not to put beans in their ears?

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 Sep 98 - 02:51 PM

Well, if you're in the mood for obnoxious songs and such, Click here. I think this is the most extensive collection of camp songs I've encountered. There are some mistakes in spelling and content, I suppose, but I guess we can chalk that up to the "folk process" or the "oral tradition." Whatever the case, it sure is a great collection.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: Tune Add: BEANS IN MY EARS
From: Snuffy
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 06:08 PM

This is on Mmario's Missing Tunes List, so here's an ABC of it

X: 239
T:Beans In My Ears
M:2/4
L:1/8
Q:1/8=180
C:Len Chandler
S:from memory of Serendipity Singers recording
N:296 BEANEARS
K:G
D|G2 B G|D2 G B|e2 d d|d3 z|
w:My mom-my said not to put beans in my ears!
d2 c c|c3   z|e2 d d|d3
w:Beans in my ears! Beans in my ears!
D|G2 B G|D2 G B|e2 d d|d3 z|
w:My mom-my said not to put beans in my ears!
d4    |c2 A2 |G3 ||
w:BEANS in my ears!

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: greg stephens
Date: 09 Nov 02 - 06:24 PM

And recorded, of course, in 1964 by the legendary
LONNIE DONEGAN RIP
(though not, I regret to say, one of his classics).

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 04:57 AM

The US-American Gus Backus had kind of succes with this song in German:
'Bohnen in die Ohr'n'.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: Beans in my Ears?
From: GUEST
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 05:28 AM

Do children actualy put beans in their ears. This has confused me since I first heard the song back in the sixties. Since then I have had children who ate chalk and soil but never put anything in their ears. Is this an American tradition.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: denise:^)
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 03:45 PM

Kids will put any small thing into any small opening...

I had a preschooler once, some years back, who put a pussywillow in her nose...WAY up in her nose!!

Some kids are notorious for it, others never try it...

denise:^)
who's had nearly 800 kids so far!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: Snuffy
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 07:48 PM

800 kids -What are you? queen bee? rabbit?

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 08:43 PM

I think this is one of those urban legends that has a large element of truth to it. True, kids will put just about anything into just about any aperture - on their own body or elsewhere. The urban legends are the stories of the things that grew or hatched from thatever was inserted where it shouldn't have been.
I suspect many of these legends were created by mothers, desperate to come up with a reason why Susie shouldn't be putting safety pins there.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: open mike
Date: 11 Nov 02 - 09:27 PM

I REMEMBER ONCE WE SANG THIS SONG ON THE WAY TO THE EMERGENCY ROOM
AFTER A KIDS' CRAFT SESSION-ONLY THE WORDS WENT mAMMA SAID NOT TO PUT BEADS IN YOUR EARS.....THE E.R. NURSE HAD A TINY, CURVED HEMOSTAT
THAT REMOVED THE TROUBLESOME LITTLE BEAD...

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: EBarnacle1
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 12:45 AM

Songs and Sketches of the Fist Clearwater Crew lists Len Chandler, 1964, Fall River Music, Inc. for the song. The only additional verse mentioned is "Oh, maybe it's fun to have beans in your ears."

The line cited earlier, "What's that you say" is meant to be shouted.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: Scabby Douglas
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 03:45 AM

My neice managed to put a peanut waaaaay up her nose, necessitating a trip to hospital for removal.

And you know those cotton bud things - Q-Tips in the US? - well, a certain adult* of my acquaintance - despite advice from *close* family members and all exhortations on the packaging (DO NOT STICK THESE WAAAAY INSIDE YOUR EARS, YOU DOOFUS!!!)... managed TWICE to lose the tip of said item necessitating trips to medical practitioners..

So it does happen, and not just to kids.....

(OK... it was me....)


Cheers


Steven

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: Genie
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 04:30 AM

I know this isn't the one that this thread is about, but I also love the "They Did It 'Cause We Said 'No'" song that the two fathers sing in "The Fantasticks!"

"Why did the kids but beans in their ears?
No one can hear with beans in their ears.
After a while, the reason appears:
They did it 'cause we said 'No!"

Why did the kids pour jam on the cat,
Raspberry jam all over the cat?
Why would the kids do something like that?
They did it 'cause we said 'No.'

My son was once afraid to swim, The water made him wince,
Until I said he MUSN'T swim --
's been swimmin' ever since!"

---------
I can't remember all the lyrics, but the other bridge is:

"Your daughter brings a young man home, says 'Do you like him, paw?'
Just say that he's a fool, and then, you've got a son-in-law!"

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: denise:^)
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 03:30 PM

Nope, Snuffy--
I'm a school teacher...

denise:^)
(who thought that one would be easy!)

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears?
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 16 Nov 03 - 12:18 AM

I'm glad to finally find the lyrics to this song so I can prove to my husband that I'm not making it up. I remember it from when I was a child in 1965. I was one of those children who put something in my ear, only it wasn't a bean and I ended up in the hospital having surgery to remove it!!! I did it because I was bored in school one day I guess. I remember I was humming the song at that time.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears (Len Chandler)
From: Mark Ross
Date: 04 Aug 09 - 12:02 AM

Why do the children pour molasses on the dog,
When I specifically told them not to put molasses on the dog?

Why do the children put beans in their ears,
When I specifically told them not to put beans in their ears?

That specifically comes from Carl Sandburg(although I think he said cat not dog). I sing this with pre-schoolers every week and they love it, especially when I go around the room and insert each of their names in the verse, "Hey------ let's go put some beans in our ears.....". I use two kids for every verse, but it still can take a while.

Mark Ross

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears (Len Chandler)
From: DADGBE
Date: 04 Aug 09 - 05:01 PM

Hie Joe,

I'd sure like to go to that link you posted bit didn't work for me. Maybe they've got beans in their ears.

Thanks,
Ray

---

The Camp Pico Blanco Songbook is now here (click).
-Joe-

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Beans in my Ears (Len Chandler)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 07 Aug 09 - 11:15 AM

From A Polyglot of Foreign Proverbs by Henry George Bohn (London: Henry G. Bohn, 1857), page 145:

Er hat Bohnen in den Ohren. He has beans in his ears. (Who so deaf as he that will not hear.)

*********

From Puck [an American humor magazine apparently patterned on the British "Punch"] (New York: Keppler & Schwarzmann, Vol. X, No. 247, November 30, 1881), page 196:

HIS EXPERIMENT.

The other day a small boy, who is noted for a love of experimenting, poured a lot of molasses on the cat, who immediately went in the house and jumped into the lap of the boy's mother, who had just donned a silk dress to go out calling. We don't want to go into unpleasant details, but the natural impression on seeing her go for that boy with the first thing she laid her hands on, is that that boy will try a different scheme the next time he is suffering for scientific diversion.

*********

From The Making of a Teacher by Martin G. Brumbaugh (Philadelphia: The Sunday School Times Company, 1905), page 295:

One teacher who thought he would avoid any possible wrong-doing on the part of his pupils noticed in a school-yard a wood-shed. Thereupon he announced to the children that they must not play on the roof of that wood-shed. It hadn't entered the minds of the children that that was a good place to play, but at the suggestion of the teacher they soon found out that the roof was the only spot on earth that would afford adequate pleasure. Sometimes as many as seventeen were found upon it! A very well-disposed mother, but not wise, on leaving her home one day, said to the older children, "Now be sure to put no beans in the baby's ears." The children had never thought of such a thing, but when she returned the baby's ears were well filled with beans!

[Note: I found several other examples of the same or similar anecdotes.--JD]

*********

From The Complete Poems of Carl Sandburg by Carl Sandburg (New York: Harcourt, 1991), page 487f:

[from "The People, Yes", originally published 1936]

41

"Why did the children
put beans in their ears
when the one thing we told the children
they must not do
was put beans in their ears?"

"Why did the children
pour molasses on the cat
when the one thing we told the children
they must not do
was pour molasses on the cat?"