There have been some strange things I have picked up over the years that took quite a while to memorize. Have there been similar things in your life?
Examples:
A co-worker helped me figure out some song or whatever that went “Beep belly oten doten bo bo be deeten dotten” and may have been something I had never heard but she had.
A guy we worked with named Hendon became (through the efforts of a creative co-worker) “Hem-bli-a-lude-li-a-gub-li-a-ga-mum”
Brother Dave Gardner had this little ditty he did in one of his bits “School bells ringing, children singing, bah bah zah bah rah bah zah bah hah bah zah bah gib a zing” (or something along those lines – I listened to the record and copied it out phonetically. It might have been altogether different but it was fun to sing anyway.)
A classmate in high school had this little thing he would say from time to time, “Nappy chin dog boy wine pig numb nut”
An uncle would ask somebody he had just met for the first time, “How’s your cock-a-rostus been gad-ji-tat-ing, already yet not, huh?”
A work buddy could do a perfect imitation of the Tasmanian Devil on cue.
It could very well be. This gal and I were at lunch one day and out of the blue she came out with this set of syllables. In response to what, I just don’t remember. All I remember was being fascinated with how weird it sounded, and I got her to repeat it to me long enough to transcribe the syllables and then memorize them. As you can tell, that memorization has lasted.
One that hasn’t lasted is that banana-fanna-fo-fanna thing. I never cared enough about that one to try to remember it.
Another is the real words to “ollie ollie oxen free” (or whatever they are – there’s even a thread or more discussing that very idea) since the kids I played whatever game they may have been appropriate for just said something like “Oley oley able sings” or “coming ready or not.”
There used to be a website with audio clips from some of Dave’s records and this one was among them. So I did a search for the quote (minus the nonsense) and found references to Robert Hall, as in “time to go to Robert Hall again.”
Now, I do recall Robert Hall clothing shops. I don’t remember any of them in central Alabama in the late 50’s and early 60’s, which is the period when Brother Dave was a big item on radio, TV and records. But I assume it’s possible he just scatted or jazzed up the Robert Hall portion of the ditty.
I can’t even remember for sure which of his bits he used it in.
I remember it as “Beet biddley oden boden bo bo badidden dodden wotten notten shhhhh.”
It was the end of a really weird ritual in which one child would tickle the other while singing nonsense. Let me try and remember how it went:
Vista. Kumula kumula kumula vista
no no no no no na vista
eeneemeeni decimeeni oowah dawoddemeeni
exemeeni solemeeni oowah da-waHH
Beet biddley oden boden bo bo badidden dodden wotten notten shhhhh
My name is… Pee-eye pickle-eye pickle-eye oni, um-bum-boni, Chinese chopsticks whoa!
And a song we sang in Girl Guides.
“Ging gang gooley gooley gooley gooley wacha ging gang goo, ging gang goo… ging gang gooley gooley gooley gooley wacha ging gang goo, ging gang goo… Hey-la, hey-la shay-la, hey-la shaaaay-la hey-la ho, sholley wolley sholley wolley sholley wolley sholley wolley… oompah! oompah! oompah!” (oompahs repeat as the other half of the group starts again at “Ging gang gooley…”)
Just about all references to places, brand names, etc., in professional comedy have to do with New York or Southern California. (Before the '60s, mostly about New York.) This is necessary because you want the industry people to laugh at your stuff.
I also recall my high school music teacher attempting to transcribe the lyrics to Grease from just the CD with no notes. Our school was planning to put on a production of it. I have no idea why we were unable to find the lyrics; all I have is the vivid memory of that poor man spending a week in front of a computer repeatedly playing snippets of We Go Together trying to piece together many lines on the order of ‘shoo bop shoo wata wata jimminy boo sha boo’. Somehow I suspect he’d do pretty well at reciting it now.
ARGH! Now you see, we had a song like this in Girl Guides, but not this. After seeing this, though, the one I want to remember is riiight on the tip of my tongue…
OH! I remember it! [I’m certain I’ve spelled everything wrong]:
“Shay shay coolay, shay shay coolay, shayshay covista, shayshay covista, covista lumba, comista lumba, ka ka shee lumba, ka ka shee lumba - ooh! Ba da day! Ooh! Ba da day!”
… whoa.
And then there’s that Kids in the Hall tune:
Hoedeeotendotenday, hoedeeotenday-oh, hoedeeotendotenday, cutting out a cooooupon!
I sang a slightly different version of this around the campfire as a Cub Scout. It was also made into an extremely ass-kicking rock song, called “Vista,” on the album Flip Flop by Guadalcanal Diary.
Fantastic. Must be from a similar source. My gal may have said something about a song, but I took it to mean some pop song you’d be likely to hear on the radio if you listened to such stations. Yours sounds plausible and appropriately kid-like.
Close … it’s “tikki tikki tembo no sa rembo chari bari ruchi pip peri pembo”. (I had $50 worth of Amazon.com gift certificates to spend on my baby boy, and this is one of the books I considered.)
Some of this (particularly the scout/guide campfire songs) is called mouth music. Just thought I’d mention that, as it’s an interesting term to search on.
