# Inserting song lyrics into alternate tunes: List your faves! **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 29, 2010, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419 "2010-09-29T01:15:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/21 "2010-10-01T18:35:13Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > And your OP mentioned the one I came in to mention – O Little Town of Bethlehem to House of the Rising Sun. I heard it almost 20 years ago, on an album called “A Twisted Christmas.” Try singing ‘Rising Sun’ to “O Little Town of Bethlehem.” Makes the bit about going back to New Orleans to wear that ball and chain sound downright peaceful. A short list of songs to ballad meter: House of the Rising Sun Amazing Grace O Little Town of Bethlehem Auld Lang Syne America the Beautiful Yellow Rose of Texas “Gilligan’s Island” theme I’m sure others can add to this. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/22 "2010-10-01T18:41:25Z")
> [@si\_blakely](#): > > My real favourite, though, is Weird Al’s **Money For Nothing/Beverly Hillbillies**. > > Si I like his Safety Dance/Brady Bunch. ---
**Author:** ![missred](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/missred/32/14096_2.png) [@missred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/missred)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/23 "2010-10-01T18:45:54Z")
One that I learned in girl scout camp in the seventies was _Amazing Grace_ to the tune of _I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing_. What can I say? It was the seventies. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/24 "2010-10-01T18:46:22Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > Not long ago it was pointed out to me that a lot of song lyrics fit well into other well-known tunes. Specifically, that the words for **Amazing Grace** fit nicely into the tune for **Gilligan’s Island** , and vice versa. I found it incredibly amusing to belt out the inverted tunes, and friends and family found it quite annoying. > > Likewise discovering that **O Little Town of Bethlehem** and **House of the Rising Sun** could be interchanged (example on youtube [here](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJP68GrLT38)) was also a treat. > > Anyone else have similar faves? Evidently there are a bunch of songs compatible with the meter of Amazing Grace and Gilligans Island. I used to insert the lyrics of Gilligan’s Island into Stairway to Heaven and get Stairway to Gilligan’s Island. The tempo change “And as we wind on down the road” becomes; The weather started getting rough pretty funny ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/25 "2010-10-01T18:48:25Z")
> [@Intergalactic\_Gladiator](#): > > The Spider-Man theme can be sung to the tune of Eidel Weis. FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU now I’m never going to be able to get that out of my head :smack: get out :smack: get out :smack: get out nope, still there > [@si\_blakely](#): > > My real favourite, though, is Weird Al’s **Money For Nothing/Beverly Hillbillies**. Also, his Brady Bunch (to the tune of Safety Dance) ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Q](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/898d66/32.png) [@Johnny\_Q](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Q)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 6:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/26 "2010-10-01T18:49:15Z")
> [@Made\_in\_Macau](#): > > > [@si\_blakely](#): > > > > The experts at this are the **I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue** team, for whom **One Song to the Tune of Another** is a regular game. > > I heard one of the panel on this great show sing Squeeze’s ‘Cool For Cats’ (hardly a lyric with ballad metre) to the tune of ‘Windmills of Your Mind’. Brilliant. > > MiM There’s also the theme from The Muppet Show done to the tune of A Whiter Shade of Pale. ---
**Author:** ![cosmosdan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@cosmosdan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cosmosdan)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/27 "2010-10-01T19:08:34Z")
> [@blondebear](#): > > [Stairway to Gilligan’s Island](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTCYLbFxTpI) Interesting, I slowed the lyrics down quite a bit more when I do it. ---
**Author:** ![FallenAngel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@FallenAngel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FallenAngel)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 8:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/28 "2010-10-01T20:33:23Z")
Pink Floyd’s “Run like Hell” and the Springsteen version of “Jersey Girl” are interchangeable. ---
**Author:** ![Labdad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/439d5e/32.png) [@Labdad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labdad)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/29 "2010-10-01T20:39:56Z")
> [@h.sapiens](#): > > > [@Eutychus](#): > > > > So can Emily Dickinson’s “[Because I Could Not Stop For Death](http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15395)” > > Someone once pointed out to me that many of Emily Dickinson’s poems can be sung to the tune of “The Yellow Rose of Texas”. As well as “Oh! Susanna” ---
**Author:** ![Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/le_ministre_de_l_au-dela/32/12181_2.png) [@Le\_Ministre\_de\_l\_au-dela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Le_Ministre_de_l_au-dela)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2010, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/30 "2010-10-01T21:16:00Z")
Don Francks used to sing ‘My Favourite Foolish Things’ - ‘These Foolish Things’ sung to the melody of ‘My Favourite Things’ and vice versa. ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [October 2, 2010, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/31 "2010-10-02T03:20:53Z")
Here’s a list I compiled from the previous times this subject has come up. Thanks to the original posters. Sorry for duplicates already mentioned. > [@](#): > > meter 8.6.8.6 > Stairway to Heaven > Gilligan’s Island > Amazing Grace > House of the Rising Sun > O Little Town of Bethlehem > God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen > Australian National Anthem (Advance, Australia Fair) > Rime of the Ancient Mariner > any Emily Dickinson poem > Yellow Rose of Texas > America the Beautiful > > meter 8.7.8.7 > The Marine Corps song “From the halls of Montezuma” > My Darling Clementine > Beethoven’s Ode to Joy > > meter 8.5.8.5 > On top of Old Smokey/spaghetti > Chariots of Fire > > The Itsy-Bitsy Spider > Stan Rogers’ “Mary Ellen Carter” > > Rubber Duckie > Surfer Girl > > Devil Went Down To Georgia > The Thing (Phil Harris) > > A Day in the Life > Green Acres > > William Blake’s Tyger, Tyger: to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little > Star. Or Camptown Races. > > Jabberwocky: Greensleeves. Hernando’s Hideaway. > > Camp Granada (“Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah”) (with minor alterations) > Smells Like Teen Spirit (loud section) > > Jesus Christ Superstar, the Apostles song (Look at all my trials and tribulations, sinking in a gentle pool of wine, etc.) > Everything’s up to date in Kansas City, they’ve gone about as far as they can go… from Oklahoma. > > First part of “Stairway to Heaven” / “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” > > Longfellow’s poem “Excelsior” can be sung to the Underdog theme. ---
**Author:** ![Dan\_Norder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4af34b/32.png) [@Dan\_Norder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dan_Norder)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2010, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/32 "2010-10-03T17:05:54Z")
One I’ve been doing for ten years or so is “I’m a Little Teapot” to the Ramones’ “I Wanna Be Sedated.” It needs to be forced a tad, which works because you leave just enough Ramones in there for people to figure out what you’re doing even if you’re drunk and/or off tune: \*\*Twenty-twenty-twenty four hours to go, I’m a little teapot Nothin’ to do and nowhere to go-oh-oh, I’m a little teapot I’m a little teapot, I’m short and I’m stout Here is my handle, and here is my spout When I get all steamed up, you can hear me shout: ‘Tip me over and pour me ooooouuuuuuuut!’ Bam-bam-bamp-bam ba-bam-bam-bamp-bam - I’m a little teapot\*\* I’ve not yet gotten up the nerve to do this at karaoke night yet, but I occasionally amaze/amuse/annoy my friends/pets/strangers with it. ---
**Author:** ![Suburban\_Plankton](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/suburban_plankton/32/219_2.png) [@Suburban\_Plankton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suburban_Plankton)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2010, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/33 "2010-10-03T18:44:29Z")
> [@74westy](#): > > Lately I’ve been playing with singing the words of The Star Spangled Banner to the tune of the old Soviet national anthem. There are some rough spots like gleaming/streaming only have one note for two syllables but on the whole, it works surprisingly well. I’m not sure about that one, but it works pretty well set to the tune of _Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald_. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_A.Robrin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sam_a.robrin/32/14497_2.png) [@Sam\_A.Robrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_A.Robrin)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2010, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/34 "2010-10-03T21:45:01Z")
Here’s my list: \*\* SONGS THAT CAN BE SUNG TO THE TUNE OF “THE BALLAD OF GILLIGAN’S ISLAND”\*\* Mickey Mouse Club Theme Song Stairway to Heaven [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xG2lTB-UVvs](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xG2lTB-UVvs) House of the Rising Sun Yankee Doodle Pop Goes the Weasel Peaceful Easy Feeling I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing Yellow Rose of Texas Ghost Riders of the Sky Rocky Top Lion Sleeps Tonight Tangled Up in Blue Whiter Shade of Pale Light My Fire O Little Town of Bethlehem Jingle Bells God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen Greensleeves Jolly Old St. Nicholas The First Noel O Tannenbaum It Came Upon a Midnight Clear I’ll Be Home for Christmas Take Me Out to the Ball Game In-a-Gadda-da-Vida Marines’ Hymn Wabash Cannonball America the Beautiful The Internationale Onward Christian Soldiers Ode to Joy Mack the Knife A Hundred Bottles of Beer Clementine La Cucaracha Semper Paratus The Wearing of the Green (The Rising of the Moon) The Itsy-Bitsy Spider I’ve Been Working on the Railroad Sympathy for the Devil Rollin’ Down to Old Maui Acres of Clams Bread and Roses Sink the Bismarck _Poems that apply:_ Jabberwocky Little Miss Muffet Jack and Jill Doctor Foster went to Gloucester Little Jack Horner Itsy Bitsy Spider Mary Mary Quite Contrary _Anything_ by Emily Dickinson Some need a little tucking and tweaking, of course, but they all work interchangeably. ``` Oh, and since "Spider-Man" and "Edelweiss" have different rhyme schemes, they don't really work interchangeably. Likewise, "Kubla Khan" has a whole extra line that precludes it fitting the above. ``` ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2010, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/35 "2010-10-03T22:35:03Z")
Since **Qadgop** started this thread, and led off with a Christmas carol, I’ll mention that someone here once mentioned singing “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” to the tune of “O come o come Emmanuel”, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since. Although, to be fair, for all we know “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” really is sung to that tune. Also on the Christmas note, but going secular, since last Christmas I’ve been playing around with swapping the tunes to “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Frosty the Snowman”. I’m not very good at it, though… I kept on slipping back into the “right” song. ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [October 3, 2010, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/36 "2010-10-03T23:08:26Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Although, to be fair, for all we know “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” really is sung to that tune. Not that far off, per Howard Shore’s version of [Elbereth Gilthoniel](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GL5gbwWsWlo&p=0FFD120A96BD982A&playnext=1&index=25) :eek: ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2010, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/37 "2010-10-04T04:12:30Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Since **Qadgop** started this thread, and led off with a Christmas carol, I’ll mention that someone here once mentioned singing “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” to the tune of “O come o come Emmanuel”, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since. > > Although, to be fair, for all we know “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” really is sung to that tune. Fascinating. You can also sing it to _Ave Maris Stella_ (which seems a bit more appropriate) and _Pange Lingua_. ---
**Author:** ![RiverRunner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/977dab/32.png) [@RiverRunner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RiverRunner)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2010, 5:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/38 "2010-10-13T17:58:40Z")
Not quite what Qadgop was looking for, but I ran into [this wonderful mashup](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiH1wNmZTII) the other day. It’s now on my iPod. ---
**Author:** ![5\_time\_champ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/5/278dde/32.png) [@5\_time\_champ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/5_time_champ)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2010, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/39 "2010-10-13T20:19:43Z")
A local group in St Louis has recorded the lyrics of _Rudolph the Red- Nosed Reindeer_ to the melody of _Free Bird_. ---
**Author:** ![NoCoolUserName](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5fc32e/32.png) [@NoCoolUserName](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NoCoolUserName)\ **Post date:** [October 14, 2010, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419/40 "2010-10-14T02:36:49Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > …someone here once mentioned singing “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” to the tune of “O come o come Emmanuel”, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head since. > > Although, to be fair, for all we know “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” really is sung to that tune… Actually, “Emmanuel” was later (somewhere in the 6th or early 7th age) ret-conned onto the real tune of “O Elbereth Gilthoniel” and no one now remembers that it was so. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inserting-song-lyrics-into-alternate-tunes-list-your-faves/555419.md?page=3)