Dear Kerry,
As you know, I can write okay lyrics but can’t write amazing melodies. As I was listening to our local classic rock station this morning I realized my lack of talent really shouldn’t stop me:
"Song Sung Blue" by Neil Diamond is Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21, second movement.
"Annie's Song" by John Denver is really Tchaikovsky’s song: Symphony No. 5, second movement. The divorce now makes sense.
"Uptown Girl" by Billy Joel is Ravel’s Bolero. I don’t want to know when and where Billy discovered this, but I think it evolved Christie Brinkley.
"Clothesline Saga” by Bob Dylan is based on Bobbi Gentry's “Ode to Billy Joe”. So that’s what happened to Bobbie Gentry.
"A Groovy Kind of Love" is heavily based on the Rondo movement of Sonatina in G major, op. 36 no. 5 by Muzio Clementi. Extra points here for stealing from obscure source material. Any fool can steal from Mendelssohn.
"I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Jesus Christ Superstar is the slow movement form Mendelssohn's violin concerto in Em.
"Somewhere" from West Side Story takes a phrase from the slow movement of Beethoven's 'Emperor' Piano Concerto, which forms the start of the melody, and also a longer phrase from the main theme of Pyotr Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake. (Stephen Sondheim hates his lyrics to this song. The phrase is so short that he had to put the emphasis is on the “Ah”… “There’s AAA place for us…” A friend of his calls this the “Ahhh Song”.
"American Tune" by Paul Simon was Johann Sebastian Bach's tune first, from his St. Matthew’s Passion
"All by Myself" by Eric Carmen - borrows heavily from Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor.
"Never Gonna Fall in Love Again" by Eric Carmen borrows from the Adagio of Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 2.
‘This Train Is Bound for Glory’ Woody Guthrie’s machine borrowed the gospel song ‘This Train’ but added better lyrics.
"I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" by Joseph McCarthy and Harry Carroll - based on the Fantasie Impromptu in C Sharp Minor by Frédéric Chopin.
“Stranger in Paradise" by George Forrest and Robert Wright, in the Broadway musical Kismet, is based on a theme from Alexander Borodin's Polovetsian Dances.
"A Lover's Concerto" by the Toys is based on J.S. Bach's Notebook for Anna Magdalena Bach.
"A Whiter Shade of Pale" by Procol Harum is (loosely) based on J.S. Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3, Air (commonly known as Air on a G String) and Cantata 140 "Sleepers Awake".
"Could It Be Magic" by Barry Manilow was inspired by Chopin's Prelude In C Minor (Prelude #20: Largo).
"Catch a Falling Star" is a melody from Brahms’ Academic Festival Overture.
"Can't Help Falling in Love" sung by Elvis is really from Martini’s “Plaisir d'Amour”. Thank you…thank you very much.
"Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah" by Allan Sherman is Ponchielli’s “Dance of the Hours” Now you know what Allan did at camp Grenada… tried to find a rhyme for Grenada… Faddah?!
“Love Changes Everything” by Andrew Lloyd Webber is the second section of the slow movement to Schubert's D960 piano sonata.
"Girl from The North Country" by Bob Dylan is the folk song “Scarborough Fair”.
‘With God on Our Side’ by Bob Dylan is a re-working of “The Patriot Game”, an Irish ballad written by Dominic Behan.
"Surfin' U.S.A." by Brian Wilson is "Sweet Little Sixteen" by Chuck Berry.
"My Sweet Lord" by George Harrison is based on the Ronnie Mack song "He's So Fine".
“Bitter Sweet Symphony” by the Verve? Nope, The Rolling Stone “The Last Time”.
"Whole Lotta Love" by Led Zeppelin is based on "You Need Love" by Willie Dixon.
"Avalon" by Al Jolson, Buddy DeSylva is Giacomo Puccini's aria “E lucevan le stele”, from the opera Tosca. Funnier still, I don’t think Jolson had anything to do with “writing” this song. I don’t see Al as a songwriter…as a thief, sure.
"Hello, I Love You" by The Doors is Ray Davies’ "All Day and All of the Night". I can imagine the Lizard King in court claiming he was on the beach when this song just popped into his head…from the radio next to him? Game, set and match to Ray Davies.
I’m not making fun of anyone on the list – well, maybe the last few who used songs still in copyright. Part of the folk tradition is to take old folk songs and use new lyrics to make them more relevant to whatever rally you are going to. The best example of that is “John Brown’s Body is a Moldering in the Grave” became “The Battle Hymn of the Republic”. And the Civil War was one big-ass protest rally (a rally still known as the war of Northern aggression in the South.) I think it is fine to take a classical song and add your own poetry to it. That isn’t stealing; it is a sign of breeding, bitches.
Kerry, I’ll be loving you…always.
Vincent
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