Thursday, November 26, 2009

Obscure song bleg

UPDATED! see below

I'm in California right now for Thanksgiving, having come out here a little over a week ago for a memorial for Melissa's grandmother Linda, who was a remarkable, funny, vivacious woman. Melissa and her mother have been trying to figure out a song that Linda was singing at Thanksgiving last year. We've struck out on Google, and so now I turn to you, dear blog reader, for assisstance.

We know very little, only a fragment of lyrics and melody. The words are probably only partially right. Any of us could sing the portion of melody (which is just sort of a repetitive stepwise thing) we know, but here are the lyrics, such as they are:

"He puts me on his income tax /
and writes me off as [beat] property improvement"

Any ideas? The subject matter almost suggests a Marylin Monroe ditty, but as I mentioned, our Google efforts have been futile thus far. So, if anyone knows anything about this song, let me know in the comments!

UPDATE 11/27
Via Facebook, fellow Grinnell alum and all-around great guy Evan Schnell has found it. The song is called "He Takes Me Off His Income Tax," and is from a broadway musical revue called "New Faces of 1952," which launched the careers of Paul Lynde and Eartha Kitt, among others. Some of the songs are from other shows, while some, including apparently this one, are original to the revue. Part of the shtick from the show seems to be that the woman singing it is interrupted every time she sings it, several times throughout the show. So the recordings available online are all medleys of that song plus another, it seems. Thank you, Evan, for saving the day!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi, Frederick. Tell Melissa that Grandma has a recording (vinyl) of the "New Faces of 1952." I could try to copy it onto a cassette for her. Had I seen your blog earlier, I would have beat Evan to the answer! Aunt Ellen