May 2, 2008

"In the Mood"

by Cliopatria

This is cool: Josh Hosler's THE #1 SONG ON THIS DATE IN HISTORY. In the 1890s, there are some pretty awful numbers. In January 1895, for instance, the #1 hit was"Mama's Little Alabama Coon."

All the children play around
With skins so white and fair
None of them with him would ever play
So mammy in her lap, took that weeping little chap
And crooned him in her kind old way
Why don't you play in your own backyard
Never mind what the white chile do
Nobody ever would want to play
With a little black coon like you

Anyway, so I look up Billboard's #1 song on the day I was born. It's Glenn Miller's"In the Mood."

Don't miss the trombonists tossing their instruments. I can live with that. It reminds me that one year the SHA had the good sense to hire a decent dance band and I enjoyed dancing with a young historian who's now at Princeton. We should do that again.

More Comments:

Rob MacDougall - 5/2/2008

And I got the Bee-Gees. That's the nice thing about Western Civilization: it's always got further to decline and fall.

Robert Zimmerman - 5/2/2008

As a trombonist, I find the tossing business really uncomfortable.

For an antidote to the coon song, a counterpoint to Glenn Miller, some snappy instrument twirling, and sheer joy, try this bit of Ellington:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R16srtaVIc8

My song, from 1961, is so bad I won't even mention it.

Ed Schmitt - 5/2/2008

Just looked mine up and it was Three Dog Night's "Mama Told Me Not to Come." I was six weeks premature...

Ralph E. Luker - 5/2/2008

... a chapter in the decline and fall of western civilization, no doubt.

Jonathan Dresner - 5/2/2008

But I got the Monkees' "Daydream Believer".....