SONG TITLES
Sir,-A programme note for 3ZB, April 7, remarks on the length and inanity of some song titles. "In Gilly Gilly Ossen feffer Katzenellen Bogen By The Sea" is certainly a mouthful, but in length it is outstripped by the Oedipus-complex sounding "I Want A Girl Just Like The Girl That Married Dear Old Dad." By cheating a little it is possible to go one better with the even more Freudian "How Can You Believe Me When -I Say I Love You (When You Know I’ve Been A-Liar All My Life)." But surely the nadir of bathos and banality was reached in the early 1920’s by the two gentlemen who composed a lament ‘entitled "They Needed a Songbird In Heaven So God Took Caruso Away"?
PETER
HARCOURT
(Wellington).
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19550506.2.12.4
Bibliographic details
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 823, 6 May 1955, Page 5
Word count
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129SONG TITLES New Zealand Listener, Volume 32, Issue 823, 6 May 1955, Page 5
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
Copyright in the Denis Glover serial Hot Water Sailor published in 1959 is owned by Pia Glover. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this serial and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the Listener. You can search, browse, and print this serial for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Pia Glover for any other use.
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