This site is kinda fun. Overlooking — as you MUST — that it’s hosted by some fellow calling himself “Ostin Allegro,” the site tells you which pop/rock songs through the ages (well, since 1955) were derived from which classical pieces. Also, it gives you mp3 snippets of each original and each derivative for your listening pleasure. Oh, and a little column of “editorial comments” on each pair. Some pairings I knew, some — sad to say — I didn’t.
For instance, I stumbled across:
Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (1963) which I actually DID know came from Ponchielli’s Dance of the Hours. But, um, seriously, what was the dealio with that song?
Hello, Muddah
Hello, Faddah
Here I am at
Camp Granada
blahda blahda
blahda blahda
blahda blahda blahda blahda blahda blahda
I guess it was meant to be a funny song, but was it really screamingly funny when it came out in 1963? Or was it more of an “I’m so embarrassed for this twit” funny? Was it a big hit? Was it just a novelty song? Was the singer just the Weird Al Yankovic of his era? I’m just wonderin, ‘s’all.
Then there’s this one I didn’t know:
Elvis Presley’s Can’t Help Falling in Love came from Plaisir d’Amour by some chap named Martini il Tedesco. I admit, I’ve never hoid a’him. But if you didn’t know that one either, give it a listen. It’s beautiful.
Of, course there’s some we probably all know, like this one:
Barry Manilow’s Could it be Magic coming from Chopin’s Prelude in C Minor. Oh, man! I’ve always loved Barry Manilow and I will make no excuses for this love. I love the sappiness. I remember how it was so utterly HUGE and fulfulling at a time when I was probably too young to really get it. Still, those songs …. I just felt like my heart was swelling too big for my body. So do not attempt to disparage him to me! He writes the songs the whole world sings and you damn well know it.
So, come on, let’s ALL sing this one together:
Spirit move me, every time I’m near you
Whirling like a cyclone in my mind
Sweet Melissa, angel of my lifetime
Answer to all answers I can find
(C’MON, SING, PEOPLE):
Baby I love you, come, come, come into my arms
Let me know the wonder of all of you
And baby I want you now, now, now and hold on fast
Could this be the magic at last?
Ahhhhhhh.
Now go check out that site. Which ones did you know? Which ones didn’t you know?
Actually, Tracey, Allan Sherman (“Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh”) was bigger in his era, the early ’60s, than Weird Al was in a later one. I’m pretty sure Sherman’s album “My Son The Folk Singer” sold more than a million, which at the time was a huge number for an album and a very, very successful number for a single. His appeal, at least to me, was he seemed like “everyman,” able to carry a tune but clearly no singer, and every song had him expressing feelings of being beleaguered by forces beyond his control. Even his appearance, bespectacled and overweight (but not obese), added to the “everyman” image. He died much too young, in his late 40s, I believe.
And, ah, “Could It Be Magic”–such a quiet beginning, and such pounding intensity at its, uh, climax, followed by the quiet ending reflecting the quiet beginning. Critics be damned. The song is a masterpiece, a rare case of taking a classical song and making it even better.
I knew the better known of these
One he left out, though, is “This Night” by Billy Joel (1983), whose melody is Beethoven’s “Pathetique”. Joel even credits this on the album.
Want to check out their “Song of the Salesman” later…
I knew the Manilow thing, and Eric Carmen’s, and a lot of the Presley stuff. “Lover’s Concerto” is fabulous, I’d forgotten that one. (Wasn’t there a song where the tune was written without lyrics by a Civil War general or a Vice President or something?)
OH – and it’s hilarious to see that P. Diddy ripped off the chorale from “Agnus Dei” in the same song he ripped off wholesale from Sting and the Police.
Not being well versed in the classics, I knew very few of the entries, but I had to comment because I also LOVE LOVE LOVE Barry Manilow, and like you, I refuse to apologize for this!
My husband, who is such a man’s man in everything else, also likes Barry…and he is secure enough in his manliness to admit it.
We were supposed to go see him in Vegas for our anniversary, but something came up. Maybe next year.
Dave — Hey, thanks for the info on that Allan Sherman. I had no idea! Interesting,
Nightfly — Haha! P. Diddy! Am I the only one who kinda wants to smack him?
Shannon — Hooray! It’s liberating to admit to our secret loves that others may deem cheesy, isn’t it? I think we all have ’em.