When my kids were much younger, we owned a cassette version of Michael Feinstein’s Pure Imagination. (This was a long time ago!) It was a great collection of songs we all loved: Lydia the Tattooed Lady, Teddy Bear’s Picnic, Swingin’ on a Star, The Ugly Bug Ball, and the title song, from Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
But the one that captured our imagination had to be “The Dressing Song” from the impossible to describe film, The 5,000 Fingers of Dr. T. Turns out Theodor Seuss Geisel (yes, Dr. Seuss) wrote the story, screenplay and lyrics–which explains a lot.
Thanks to my son James for the reminder: just in case you haven’t heard, today is Do-mi-do Day!
Wish I had those cutie chamois booties with the leopard skin bows, don’t you?
That’s not quite the whole story. We loved this song from the cassette but had no idea its origin. There was no internet so we couldn’t do a search and find out the context of the song: all we knew was that Feinstein had selected it for his album of children’s songs, and that it was delightful.
And then, years after the song had become part of our family canon, we were watching this daffy movie and suddenly Hans Conried starts singing the song: the dressing song! The experience of simultaneously seeing the song paired with visuals, and finally understanding where it come from, and watching this bit of Nye family secret lore finally explained was very memorable. We all shrieked with recognition and delight but then had to muffle our reactions so we could enjoy the number. And what a number it is. That Conried, what a pro.
Yes–and so it was! HC enunciates every delicious syllable. Thanks for filling in the blanks!
Had never heard of the movie or the song – how imaginative and unmistakable Dr. Seuss-ish.
Thank you!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Ah, CASSETTES! 🙂
Thanks for stopping by my blog…visiting you back!
Technology changes so fast / cassettes is a reminder of that! 🙂
True! Thanks for stopping by.