I was leafing through the postcards in my Music and Songs category, reminiscing about the hoops some of these songs made me jump through, sometimes just to find out the line reference WAS from a song. I still have my suspicions about some others, but the research is seldom simple, as this type of gag seems to have withered to nearly nothing by the 1920s. But as I looked over the array, it made me wonder how much my many fanatic readers recall about these songs.
YOU, of course, have memorized every pearl of wisdom secreted by my computer. But you can try some of these questions on your less attentive friends, and thus garner bragging rights/
1.Bert Williams seems to have contributed dozens of catchphrases (what we called ‘memes’ in my day). Which of the following factoids is NOT true about Bert Williams?
a.producer/writer/star of the first all-Black musical comedy on Broadway
b.got very tired of performing his signature song “Nobody”
c.had to leave the country after marrying a white woman
d.was for most of his career half of the comedy duo Williams & Walker
2.The Merry Widow Waltz was NOT called that in the operetta “The Merry Widow”. Its original title was
a.Queen of Heaven Waltz
b.Footloose and Fancy Free
c.Dreamy Fish Waltz
d.Once Upon a Dream
3.Why was it so hard for the young lady to find her boyfriend Kelly?
a.In search of a stage career, he changed his name to Bert O’Williams
b.She was looking for a redheaded Irish immigrant in New York City…on St. Patrick’s Day
c.He had been sent to prison
d.He had died, thinking she would never come to see him
4.This phrase had great popularity after being used in a song that had nothing to do with romance (sorry). What WAS it about?
a.What to do when pennies rain from Heaven
b.What to do during an earthquake
c.A young man being thrown out by his girlfriend’s father
d.Fixing a car.
5.Which of these is NOT a reason for the lady’s rage?
a.Bedelia is a song about a man leaving his wife
b.Bedelia was so popular in its day that people got sick of hearing it
c.Bedelia is a song about what the young man will do to worship Bedelia if she marries him
d.The singer claims he loves to hear anything Bedelia says, and this lady suspects her husband of irony
6.This postcard was one of several sequels inspired by what song?
a.Bringing Up father
b.Father Knows Best
c.Everybody Works But Father
d.Daddy Long-Legs
7.Only Me did not involve bedbugs. What WAS the trauma faced by the main character?
a.Child neglect
b.Loss of a spouse
c.Being the player who lost the big baseball game
d.Being the last soldier left to defend the fort
8.What American writer supposedly referenced this song–“I’m Afraid To Go Home in the Dark”–on his deathbed?
a.Edgar Allan Poe
b.Eugene Field
c.Stephen Foster
d.O.Henry
ANSWERS
1.c. That was heavyweight champ Jack Johnson
2.a. But if you’ve never heard the Dreamy Fish Waltz, you haven’t truly lived
3.b.I don’t believe she ever DID find him
4.d.AND the hero was wearing his Sunday suit
5.a.It WAS one of the jauntiest pop melodies of its day, so it was everywhere; I still catch myself humming it. Thanks for another earworm, Interwebs
6.c.Another of Groucho Marx’s fond memories of vaudeville days
7.a.Mom, hearing the mighty crash, fears that her favorite daughter has been injured, but she gets the answer in the title
8.d.Does it change the poignancy of his last words to know he was referencing a song about staying out drinking until dawn?
Blogsy Babbles 