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The Melody Exchange (a Modest Proposal)

November 28, 2013
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Often I will tell people who do not consider themselves poets of a poetry event coming up. Sometimes the response is “Ah, thanks, but I just don’t like poetry.” The technical term for most of these folks is Liars, especially if they have an iPod full of songs. Songs are poetry. That they are set to music is incidental.

Musical lyrics usually rely on stressed and unstressed syllable patterns that fit in poetic form (for instance, look up IAMBIC or TROCHAIC or ANAPESTIC if you are unfamiliar with those terms). A sophisticated songwriter like Paul Simon is not as yoked to stress pattern as most if he doesn’t want to be. (His word-economical “Overs” starts “Why don’t we stop fooling ourselves?” and ends “But each time I try on the thought of leaving you, I STOP/Stop and think it over…”) But–and here is my Modest Proposal for you with a chunk of computer programming under your belts–a melody exchange is possible for songs whose lyrics have identical, or even near-identical, stress patterns.

Example: Bob Dylan’s “Forever Young” may be sung to the tune of “Seven Spanish Angels.” Example, with a bit of a stretch: that weird song of the 60’s “Quick Joey Small” can borrow the Dave Clark Five’s “Catch Me If You Can,” thus:

Sheriff’s got a shotgun (ooh, oo-ooh)
Fill ya full of lead, son (true, oo-ooh.)
Sheriff’s got a blackjack (ooh, oo-ooh)
We about went out of our minds.
Catch us if you CA-AN, catch us if you CA-AA-AA-aan…

Another stretcher: Lennon/McCartney’s “You Won’t See Me” sung to the tune of the Everly Brothers “Love Hurts:”

I call
You up
You’re line’s
Engaged;
I’ve had
Enough
So act
Your age…

But the weirdest I’ve ever realized is Simon Zealotes’ song from JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR. The punchline will reveal the melody exchange:

Christ what more do you need to conVINCE you
That you’ve MADE IT and you’re EASILY as strong
As the FILTH from ROME who rape our COUNtry
And who’ve TERRorized our PEOple for so long?
The BRAdy Bunch
The BRAdy Bunch
That’s the day we all became the Brady Bunch!

 

Anapest Destiny

March 1, 2013
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Here are the words:

As aggression & madness hit home hard & bad
And the fact of the madder: insanity’s sad

Nonetheless we have need of the fight-or-flight urge
Near the dangerous nexus adrenals must splurge

And we’re grateful whilst passing this trail of tears
Agile minds are elastic & friends give 3 cheers

Pick a challenge: adapt and bid Fate do her worst
Ply a cause be adoptive grow hearts fit to burst

Esoteric & oleoresinous G R A I N
Estée-Laundering cheesiness works as a strain

Thus a madness once nasty becomes just plain silly
Take your fun while it’s tasty and run like a filly

Here are some notes:

An Anapest is a measure of meter with two unstressed syllables and then one stressed. “May this sentence exemplify anapest feet.” is a line of anapest tetrameter, that is, one line is four anapestic feet long. Perhaps the most famous example of anapest tetrameter is attributed to Clement Clark Moore, who began “A Visit from Saint Nicholas” thus: “‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house/Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.”

The acrostic is a riff on “Manifest Destiny,” a philosophy akin to “Conquer we must/If our cause it is just.” I think Manifest Destiny has had its day, and needs to not eat it too. I like Anapest Destiny a lot better: let us strive to be Poets.

“Estée Laundering” will be familiar to American fashion-conscious folk as derivative of Estée Lauder, the makeup magnate who lived to be 97 years old and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from George W. Bush in 2004, the year she died. The Presidential Medal of Freedom is the highest civilian award an American can receive. A question I pose to you, dear reader: do you find my reference to Ms. Lauder complimentary?

Anyone else want to play? Here is a page that has been a Work In Progress for about two years. I intend to finish it in two days or less.

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Suggestion: print it out and draw silly stuff in the panels, or let a youngster color it. Then try to fit some words in there that go with the letters already there. Think of it as a puzzle with whatever rules you want to use for it. Hope you have fun!