[GuyBarry]

I'm involved in running a small community choir.  At last night's rehearsal, as the members were coming in, the main leader asked me who'd arrived and I jokingly started singing the members' names to the tune of "There is Nothing Like a Dame" from South Pacific ("we've got Jackie, we've got Brenda, we've got Rachel, we've got Scott", etc.).

He had no idea what I was referring to.  He had never heard the song.  I don't think he'd even heard of South Pacific.  (And he was brought up in a musical family and has spent much of his life teaching music.)

Now he's 35 and I'm 50, so maybe it could be put down to the age difference.  But the stage version of South Pacific came out in 1949 and the film in 1958, both well before I was born.  For me it's just part of popular culture, and I'd assume that anyone with fairly broad musical tastes would know at least one or two songs from it, just as I'd expect them to know one or two songs from My Fair Lady or West Side Story or A Chorus Line or Cats or any of the classics of musical theatre.

Is that a mistaken assumption?

[PaulAds]

I don't know any of them, really. I'm 48.

If I hear something I like, I look into it further...so I'd perhaps assume that I'd either never heard them (perhaps unlikely) or heard bits of them and failed to engage with it.

[GuyBarry]

Not even the Morecambe and Wise version?

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2ox64f

(Note for younger readers: all the members of the crew were well-known newsreaders, sports presenters, weather forecasters etc. at the time - hence the audience reaction!)

[PaulAds]

What a generous studio audience 

Not my cup of tea, really...but it didn't ring any bells with me.

I was probably watching "world in action" on ITV

[GuyBarry]

Hmm.  I suppose what I find interesting about this song - and others of its era - is that I have no idea how I know it.  I've never seen South Pacific on stage, never watched the film right through (though I've seen clips), never listened to a cast album, never performed in it, and yet I can identify the song straight off, tell you where it comes from and sing large chunks of it.  I suppose I must have heard the number performed as a one-off on stage or TV so many times that it's become gradually implanted in my memory.  To me it represents part of a shared culture that is greater than the world of musical theatre itself.

There have to be more recent songs like this, surely - maybe "Send In The Clowns" from Sondheim's A Little Night Music?

[delb0y]

Karen, my partner loves musicals. She'll go and see the same show over and over. But I can't abide them. Karen loves The Sound of Music (I've never been able to watch it) and I know My Favourite Things because I have John Coltrane's version. I jest - I do have John Coltrane's version, but I know the song because all of those songs have seeped through via osmosis. That's probably what happened with you and There's Nothing Like A Dame. But for me a musical is grand way of spoiling a good story. I even struggle to watch Elvis films when he picks up a guitar on a big wheel and everyone starts singing along. If they play along or, God help us, dance, that's even worse. I did enjoy Brooke Shields in Chicago, though. And I recall a couple of songs from the Lion King are okay. I probably know a fair few songs from musicals and films without knowing which shows they come from. The Blues Brothers was good, but then there was a proper rationale for why everyone burst into song when they did, and why they could all play along. Recently went to see Jersey Boys and thoroughly enjoyed it, though, so maybe I'm weakening in my old age...

[pompeyjazz]

The Sound of music. Aghhhh No I went to see it when it was released in the sixties and still recovering. South Pacific great though only because my mum and dad sang all the songs all the time

[tboswell]

I generally like the musical as a form. In fact I would love to write one at some point.

These days those dreadful jukebox musicals that ram in songs that we all already know have kind of ruined it.

The pinnacle for me is probably West Side Story, works as songs, story and classical work in its own right. Sondheim (who wrote the words for West Side Story) can do a fine musical. He weaves themes through the piece song to song so they all hang together.
Things like Sound of Music and Mary Poppins even I regard as Genius work. I mean writing a song that is catchy and teaches you the solfage scale at the same time (do re me...) is the kind of amazing work we should all aspire to!

You should go back, listen and learn!!

Tom.

[PaulAds]

My Auntie took my brother and I to see "the sound of music" at the cinema when i was about 8.

We both hated it.

Is that "la la la America" thing from "west side story" ?

I really hate that too.

Off now to go back, listen and learn 

[tboswell]

Is that "la la la America" thing from "west side story" ?

I really hate that too.

If it ain't your cup of tea then it ain't your cup of tea.

America is a clever song, written in a compound time signature with some very funny lyrics. Worthy of looking at, understanding, appreciating the craft of it.

Then if you still don't like it, fair enough 

My big experience of hating music was country music, hated it! It's crap! It's silly!! Then one day I decided to change my mind and I love it now.
It is hard work hating things, anyway.

Any music I hate, I regard as something I can like later on...when I am bored of what I am listening to now.

The other thing I remember hating was "Everything I Do" - Bryan Adams. But it seemed as if it was gonna be at No. 1 forever and I thought, "This is a losing battle". So I decided, sod it might as well enjoy it if I'm gonna be forced to listen to it 

[delb0y]

It's funny, because something else I don't like is dance - if I'm watching, ahem, Britain's Got Talent (which genuinely is a rare event) I simply pick up a book or start browsing YouTube when dance troupes come on. Never got it. So West Side Story is something that I know I ought to watch but it's a long way down a decent-sized list of priorities. I know the La La La America song, of course. More osmosis. Tom Waits also did Somewhere on his Blue Valetines album, so I know that one too. But anytime I see that clip of all the tough guys lining up to dance I just don't get it. Too much Raymond Chandler and not enough Fred Astaire, in my formative years I guess.

Dance, musicals, operas, ballet, classical choral works, Strictly... all areas that leave me cold, and I actually see this as a good thing. There's more than enough "material" out there to keep me listening / watching / reading and learning in just the narrow areas of interest I hold. I mean, I'm not sure I'll ever listen to all the Beatles / Bob Dylan / Miles Davis albums properly in this short life time. I doubt I'll see all the movies I want to see. I know I won't read all the books I long to read. And I'm positive there are not enough hours in the day to practice the guitar enough to get to where I want to be.

I do get the value of cross-fertilisation, and I love to know as much as I can about popular culture and history and the great achievements of writers, song-writers, movie-makers, architects, generals, inventors, cave-painters, etc etc, but there is just too much stuff to address properly and assimilate in a lifetime.

It's not hate, it's just if one has an hour a day to spend on this stuff why would you not spend it on things that move and interest you as opposed to leaving you cold? Especially when you've only just scratched the surface of the top 1% of the stuff you know you'll like.

[adamfarr]

Growing up in the 1970s in music lessons we had a staple diet of show songs, songs from film musicals, Gilbert & Sullivan and the like. I'm sure that has an effect and I'm sure it doesn't happen now.

Liking is one thing, admiring or respecting (or just having absorbed) are others. I'd say almost all those songs though have something to recommend them, more often than not lyrically. Of course mostly they had a context which they needed to match being key moments in character and plot development. So they weren't necessarily meant to be stand-alone songs and possibly can be appreciated (even) more if you know or are interested in the background and characters.

[GuyBarry]

Growing up in the 1970s in music lessons we had a staple diet of show songs, songs from film musicals, Gilbert & Sullivan and the like. I'm sure that has an effect and I'm sure it doesn't happen now.

I think you've got a really good point there.  I learned all about West Side Story in music lessons when I was about nine.  I suppose my generation had teachers who grew up with this stuff, so they passed it on to the next generation.  Teachers who grew up in the 1970s probably wouldn't have passed it on any further, though, so perhaps my generation was the last one to be routinely exposed to it.  Which to me is a bit sad really - it's like teaching classical music and not telling anyone about Mozart or Beethoven.

Is "America" really the best-known song from West Side Story, by the way?  I'd have thought it was more likely to be "Maria" or "Somewhere" or "Tonight" - it's probably not the best song in the musical in my view.  (My favourite is "Gee, Officer Krupke", but that's a bit niche!)

[tboswell]

"Gee, Officer Krupke" is awesome social commentary and hilarious as well!

Love it!

[adamfarr]

Somewhere is a top quality song in any context. The intervals get me every time. Gee Officer Krupke was my favorite as a teen. Actually West Side Story is quality all through.

Mind you I can't watch the Sound of Music without crying (much to the hilarity of my family) so I clearly have this ingrained...