Music A to Z
Jun 12 '05 (Updated Jun 14 '05)
The Bottom Line Musical Alphabet Soup
Music for JAGUARDOG's Favorite Music A to Z Write-Off . Our Gracious Host said there were no time limits and no rules, and I'm really good at following the rules when there aren't any, so here's my list. It's music, or at least stuff I like to listen to. Or don't like to listen to but find interesting. Or something. Anyway, it is all related to music. Kind of.
A
Ed Ames
Anyone who can remember the '60s may identify Ed Ames as the Cherokee sidekick of Daniel Boone. Before playing that (un-)memorable role, Ames was a singer and Broadway actor in plays like "The Crucible" and "The Fantasticks". He had a beautiful baritone voice.
David Arkenstone
"Music Inspired by Middle Earth" Traditional instruments like flutes and violins combined with whistles, a melodica, dulcimer, duduk, bawu, bansari, and a harp. And some voices.
B
The Three "B"s: Brahms, Beethoven, and Bach
So I like to listen to classical music. Sorry 'bout that!
Julian Bream
"The Woods So Wild" Renaissance music played on the lute. (Warning: Has been known to mesmerize people, who then dress up in funny clothes with bells on and do Morris dances. )
C
Clancy Brothers and Tom Makem
Traditional Irish Ballads sung in both English and Gaelic. I am especially fond of a song called "Nell Flaherty's Drake" because it has the longest string of oddball Irish curses I've ever heard.
Nat King Cole
His voice was described as "liquid velvet". There was music accompanying his singing, but no one ever noticed the music.
Johnny Cash
His voice was as rough as Cole's was smooth, and just as distinctive. No one noticed the music when he sang, either.
D
Dr. Demento
Okay, I'm cheating here a bit, because DD isn't singing most of the time. He's the .. um .. boss. Or ringleader, or something. But he does sing a few little ditties like "Shaving Cream" on "Dr. Demento's Dementia Royale". Listen long enough and you too will be singing "They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!"
E
Elvis
'Nuf said.
F
Frog Chorus
No, this is not the name of a band. It is a bunch of amphibians sitting around a pond making noise. I have a pond and an abundant stock of amphibians, so I get this nice music for free, whether I want it or not. A frog chorus is a bit like house crickets, though. They wake me up when they abruptly stop croaking, and I lie awake wondering what predator was so scary that a couple hundred toads abruptly decided to shut up and pretend to be rocks. It is a conundrum I have never solved. I once had a guest who complained about the noise, so I opened the window and yelled "Listen up you frogs! You will now BE QUIET!" And they were. There was a dead silence for almost three minutes before there was a small tentative croak from some brave pond dweller. Oddly, my guest didn't complain again about the noise.
G
Glass Hammer
They are listed as a Rock band. If you can imagine a Rock band playing medieval music.
H
Holst
"The Planets" I'm especially fond of "Uranus, The Magician."
I
Burl Ives
No, I'm not listing Ives because I like his music. In fact, I always thought of his songs as "Geezer Music", because the old people loved him, and I didn't. Now that I'm one of the Old People, I like to remind myself that whatever music I think is wonderful, some rotten kid will walk in while it plays and say "Gaaaaawwd! How can you listen to that crap?"
J
Jessel
"Parade of the Wooden Soldiers"
K
Eartha Kitt
Can you say "Double Entendre"? If you have only heard "Santa Baby" sung by Madonna, then you have never heard it at all. Eartha Kitt could sing the Congressional Record and make it ooze innuendo.
Klingon Opera
It's an acquired taste.
L
Tom Lehrer
Somewhen back in time, I was in a class learning about nuclear weapons and all of their more interesting uses. There was a 3 minute video of actual film taken at ground zero of some nuclear tests. They showed the effects on various structures, vehicles, and terrain objects of the blast, heat and backblast. And we were all laughing hysterically, because the clips were accompanied by Tom Lehrer singing "We Will All Go Together When We Go." Yea, that's pretty sick. Funny, but sick – like all of Tom Lehrer's songs.
Elsa Lanchester
"Bawdy Cockney Songs" A wine-soaked voice singing "When a Lady Has A Piazza" and "If You Peek in My Gazebo" with perfectly innocent lyrics. If you find anything suspect in the lyrics, then it is entirely in your (dirty minded) head. It really is "Linda and her Londonderry Air", not "London Derriere", you evil-minded person.
M
Mozart
It was all Mozart's fault that I almost cause a crash on I-95. I was heading in to D.C. for a long night shift and listening to Mozart on National Public Radio, when a listener called in to request a particular favorite of his. "I'm not exactly sure what it is called, but it is something strange like 'I'm inclined to knock music.' " (Mozart fans will understand. Everyone else will just have to remain mystified.)
N
Napoleon XIV
"I Live in a Split-level Head" and "They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haa!"
O
Ozark Mountain Daredevils
It is not that I particularly like their music. I'm just fascinated by a Bluegrass Band with a hillbilly twang doing pop music.
P
P.D.Q. Bach
"The Wurst of P.D.Q. Bach" "My bonny lass she smelleth, Making the flowers jealouth, Fa La La La La …" Man, they just don't write songs like that any more.
Q
Quiet
Not a band, just the absence of noise. Quiet is hard to find. I mean –even in a sensory-deprivation chamber, you still have the sound of your own heartbeat and breathing.
R
Royal Scots Dragoon Guards
Bagpipes. Like Klingon Opera, it's an acquired taste.
S
Maggie Sansone
"Traditions" Celtic music on a hammered dulcimer. What's not to like?
William Shatner
An "acquired taste" that I certainly never acquired. I'm one of those people who "breaks into song because I lack any key", and I sound better than he does. He makes me feel better about singing in the shower, where I am the only audience.
T
Thunderstorm
Not a band – a recording of an actual thunderstorm. It is all of the sound without the worry that your roof might blow off. Actually, I have 3 different CDs of different storms that I switch around, because you just get tired of the same old thunderstorm all of the time.
Temple bells
In TongDuChon, South Korea, there is a Buddhist monastery high on a mountain. In the early morning I used to hear the distant sound of the temple bells ringing, and they were quite beautiful. When the Frog Chorus gets too irritating at my house, I put on a CD recording of Temple Bells and drown 'em out.
U
Urban Chipmunk
That would be the Chipmunks – Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, with their heartrending version of songs like "Mamas, Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Chipmunks."
V
Vienna Boy's Choir
But they grow up so fast.
W
Woodstock
The summer of 1969. Janis Joplin, Joan Baez, Arlo Guthrie, et. al.
X
Xumantra
Temple bells, Congo drums, gongs, chimes, guitar, and a Tibetan singing bowl. Kind of hard to classify, really.
X-rated Ditties
I can't actually listen to these unless (OH. The Horror!) I sing them myself. I have the lyrics and the music, if anyone out there can play the piano and sing. You could record a few and make a fortune. I'm sure they would be popular, as they are old, traditional Ozark Mountain ballads. Sort of.
Y
Weird Al Yankovich
The funny thing is – once I hear a Weird Al version of a song, I can never remember the original lyrics.
Z
Zager & Evans
The summer of 1969; the summer of Woodstock. And the song that was Number One on the charts was "In the Year 2525" by Zager and Evans. They were true "one hit wonders" – recording one album and then disappearing into a black hole. 1969 was a strange year.
And that's the list. I would have finished it sooner, but I had to do some research among the albums down in the den , and the resident spiders were not pleased. For the record (no pun intended), no inhabited spider abodes were harmed in the making of this list.
Check HERE for Jaguardog's list of write-off participants.
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