[QUOTE=Sternvogel]
As I read Tennyson’s Locksley Hall for a college class, I realized it could be sung to the tune of this favorite.
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You’ve no idea how much I appreciate that tidbit. I’ve tried to memorize that poem (the house/farm I grew up on was called Locksley Hall) and this helps TREMENDOUSLY! I owe you a drink.
[QUOTE=Sternvogel]
As I read Tennyson’s Locksley Hall for a college class, I realized it could be sung to the tune of this favorite.
[/QUOTE]
That also works with the Marine Song (“From the halls of Montezuma”) and Beethoven’s Ode to Joy.
We’ve had several threads on interchangeable lyrics and music, but I can’t find any of them now.
Here are other tunes for Dickinson’s poems:
O Little Town of Bethlehem
God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen
Australian National Anthem (Advance, Australia Fair)
[QUOTE=The King of Soup]
By gum, that’s it all right: I recognize it now that you’ve given it to me. If it’s not an imposition, can you tell me, in which of Asimov’s books did I read the story? I thought it was Fact and Fancy, but apparently not, and I don’t think it’s in his joke book (forgot the title, lost it long ago) either, and I’m not finding it in his Intelligent Man’s Guide to… books.
[/QUOTE]
According to this post, it’s in “Adding a Dimension”: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.chem/msg/7f444c7511cb4df6
[QUOTE=freckafree]
My fave in this category is singing Frost’s “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” to the tune of “Hernando’s Hideaway.” (The Doxology can also be sung to this tune.)
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It can also be sung to the tune of “O Tannenbaum” (aka O Christmas Tree). Go ahead, try it.
Not exactly a poem, but the Christmas hymn “O Little Town of Bethlehem” can also be sung to the tune of “House of the Rising Sun” (courtesy of Bob Rivers).
Heh. I can ruin “The Council Of Elrond” to the tune of “Yellow Rose Of Texas”:
Seek for the sword that’s broken:
In Imladris it dwells;
There shall be counsels taken
Stronger than Morgul-spells.
There shall be shown a token
That Doom is near at hand,
Isildur’s bane shall waken,
And the Halfling forth shall stand.
Try getting that out of your head next time you read LotR…
Just a week ago, a friend mentioned that, in her church that Sunday, they were going to sing Amazing Grace, not only to its own tune, but also to The House of the Rising Sun, AND Gilligan’s Island. My wife couldn’t imagine, so, with hardly a shift in mental gears, started singing Amazing Grace to Gilligan’ Island. It flows very well.
The Gilligan’s Island/Amazing Grace/Emily Dickenson/House of the Rising Sun etc. pattern is actually a remarkably common one. For a while now, I’ve been contemplating a website where you could select any of the lyrics from one long list, and any of the tunes from another long list, and hear a synthesized/autotuned rendition of the former to the tune of the latter.
The particular pairing that I had stuck in my head for an annoyingly long time was “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” to the tune of “Stairway to Heaven”.
Amazing Grace
Yankee Doodle
Auld Lang Syne
O Susanna
I’ve Been Working on the Railroad
America the Beautiful
House of the Rising Sun (as mentioned before)
etc. etc. etc.
There’s a reason it’s called “common meter.”
ETA: I see Chronos covered this as I was typing. Just google “songs in common meter” or “8686 hymns” if you’re a church going type and you’ll find plenty of songs that work together.