Jewish Stereo Types

Okay, so this isn't really a Thanksgiving song; technically it's a Christmas song. But hey, any song with the lyrics "Everybody gather round the table / Dig in, dinner's being served / Eat all the turkey you are able" is going to feel awfully Thanksgiving-y, right? So here's "Turkey Lurkey Time" by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, as sung by Margo Sappington, Baayork Lee, and Donna McKechnie in Promises, Promises : Video posted by Broadway Classics You will note that the song is awful. I mean, it's really awful--but in the context of the show, it was supposed to have been written by three secretaries as entertainment for the office Christmas party, so. (It also explains why the dance and orchestration say "1960s" so relentlessly.) But at least it gives us a turkey song! *** As I mentioned in my tribute to Neil Simon , the songwriters for Promises, Promises were both Jewish, even if Burt Bacharach, as a child at least, "didn...

When I went Googling searching my memory for songs appropriate to Veterans Day, I found I had pretty much the same problem I had looking for appropriate Memorial Day songs--lots and lots of lists of patriotic songs, but not so many that highlighted servicemen and -women. So I thought I would present serviceman Irving Berlin's complaint about army life during WWI, "Oh, How I Hate To Get Up in the Morning": Video posted by MuricaForever Since I've already written about Irving Berlin in posts about "White Christmas" and "Easter Parade," I thought I'd just bring you Irving Berlin himself, singing his own song. And now here's what he had to say about writing it: There were a lot of things about army life I didn't like, and the thing I didn't like most of all was reveille. I hated it. I hated it so much I used to lie awake nights thinking about how much I hated it. [But] I wanted to be a good soldier. Every morning when the bugle...

  And of course a song or two: "Book of Good Life" (parody of "Good Life" by OneRepublic), sung by the Maccabeats: Video posted by Maccabeats Channel   "Dip Your Apple" (parody of Waka Waka (This Time for Africa) by Shakira and John Hill), sung by the Ein Prat Fountainheads: Video posted by einpratfountainheads *** I have no reason to think any of the members of OneRepublic are Jewish--and several to think they are not--but of course the writers of the lyrics to this parody (Immanuel Shalev and David Block) are. Similarly, "Waka Waka (This Time for Africa)" had no Jewish creators of which I am aware, but the lyrics of this parody (by Ben R.) do.

Labor Day became a federal holiday in 1894, but the first of my two songs for today was written in 1930 , for the Depression-era 1932 revival of the musical revue Americana , and it's a stark reminder of the need for organized labor.   "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime," lyrics by Yip Harburg, music by Jay Gorney, sung by Bing Crosby: Video posted by warholsoup100 In its review of the revival, The New York Times particularly called out the song for praise: [Y]ou are likely to feel that Mr. Gorney has expressed the spirit of these times with more heart-breaking anguish than any of the prose bards of the day. If Mr. Hoover had asked for a song instead of a poem the other day, "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" would have been what the President ordered. Interestingly, as Rob Kapilow points out in an interview on NPR the song isn't someone asking for a handout--it's someone talking back to the system, someone saying, "I worked hard, I helped bui...

Neil Simon died this past Sunday (Aug. 26, 2018) , and his humor ran through the lives of so many of us. I'm too young to have seen Your Show of Shows , but I saw a few of his many successful plays and several of the over twenty movies for which he wrote screenplays (for some reason I particularly recall Murder by Death ). Although he never wrote any song lyrics that I know of, he did write the books for a number of musicals (and was script doctor to quite a few more), so here are some songs from some of those. RIP, Mr. Simon, you are missed.   From Sweet Charity (book by Neil Simon, music by Cy Coleman, lyrics by Dorothy Fields), "There's Gotta Be Something Better than This," sung by Chita Rivera, Donna McKechnie, and Bebe Neuwirth at a one-night only concert in 1997: Video posted by primativo7   From Promises, Promises (book by Neil Simon, music by Burt Bacharach, lyrics by Hal David), "I'll Never Fall In Love Again," sung by Kristin Chenowe...

A whole musical! Because what could be more appropriate for a holiday that celebrates the adoption of the Declaration of Independence than a show about the adoption of the Declaration of Independence? I give you 1776 , by Sherman Edwards (music, lyrics, and original book ) and Peter Stone (book). Well, okay, I'm not posting the whole musical here. I'm just going to bring a few excerpts: Opening ("Sit Down, John"), sung by Brent Spiner (as John Adams) and company: Video posted by aurora spiderwpman That's one way to get all the exposition out of the way. (As it happens, I was fortunate enough to see this 1998 revival, and loved it.)   I'm including this non-song bit because hey, some things never change! Video posted by Nicholas S. Castellano (In real life, that is something John Adams wrote in his diary , but yep, it was about New Yorkers.)   "But Mr. Adams", sung in 2009 at the Redlands Bowl: Video posted by Jason livesay John Ada...

I had a good dramatic, emotional, Fathers-Day-appropriate song all ready to go for today. But my father passed away a little less than a year ago, so I decided to look at a thing he always enjoyed instead. Rather than a single song, therefore, I thought we'd take a look at a movie musical that, no matter what you might believe from the title, is really about a father: Mary Poppins . How we know that Mary Poppins is really about the father and not about Mary Poppins is that the father is the only character that changes over the course of the film. Mary Poppins herself doesn't change--Mary Poppins NEVER changes. Jane and Michael don't change--we first see them being brought back home after running away, and near the end of the film we see them being brought back after running away. Mrs. Banks doesn't change--she is concerned about her children but distracted by her suffragette activities all the way through. But Mr. Banks changes--and he changes as a father . What coul...