Pamela D. Lloyd (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pameladlloyd) wrote2010-04-17 06:07 pm
pameladlloyd) wrote2010-04-17 06:07 pm
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"If I Only Had a Brain"
Over on Murderati, Cornelia Read posted Elvis Costello and Bill Frisell's "If I Only Had a Brain":
Watching this led me to search for other versions. Here's a very nice version by The Four Freshmen, Brian Eichenberger, Curtis Calderon, Vince Johnson, and Bob Ferreira.
"If I Only Had a Brain" is one of my favorite songs (along with just about all of the Wizard of Oz Songs), and the Costello/Frisell and Four Freshmen versions are very nice, but I still prefer the versions from the movie. There are several clips of Dorothy's meeting with Scarecrow, but all the really nice ones seem to have had embedding disabled, including this longer dance sequence, which wasn't included in the 1939 release. After much searching, I finally found a video that includes the scenes scattered through the movie in which Dorothy meets Scarecrow, Tin Man, and The Cowardly Lion and the latter two reprise the song with new lyrics: "All-In-One".
Here's the 1939 trailer to the movie.
I love the way the trailer references Baum's books, making it very clear that in 1939 the movie was very much a tribute to the books and the books were widely read. This contrasts with my impression that for later generations, such as my own and more recent ones, the movie serves as most people's primary introduction to Oz, and many people never read any of the books, or perhaps only the first.
I was very fortunate as a child to come across several of Baum's Oz books (as well as his Life and Times of Santa Claus) in the El Paso Jewish women's club (whose official name I don't remember and wasn't able to find online) annual book fair. The book fair was a spectacular event for book lovers, in which the El Paso Coliseum (big enough to house indoor rodeos and seat over 5,000 people) was filled with tables stacked high with books. We had access to shopping carts and brown paper grocery bags; a grocery bag full of books cost a quarter. Some years later, the organization opened a book store and stopped holding the annual event; the books were priced much higher in the store and all the treasures were carefully screened. Perhaps this was better for the club, but for this book lover it was a very sad change.
Finally, here's one last video I stumbled across in my search, a "fake" trailer for a movie never made (or one which may be in production&emdash;the mentions I found were unclear or contradictory), Dark Oz , an adaptation of the Calibre Comics comic book series, Oz.
In honor of this post, I purchased a copy of the the "extended version" of "If I Only Had a Brain" from Amazon. (But, be warned, this version has only the Scarecrow's verses, and not those of the Tin Man or The Cowardly Lion.)
Totally unrelated to the rest of this post is an interesting article from Lisa Gold: Research Maven. Using the recent AP Stylebook recognition of the transformation of "Web site" to "website," she discusses the patterns of acceptance of linguistic change.
Watching this led me to search for other versions. Here's a very nice version by The Four Freshmen, Brian Eichenberger, Curtis Calderon, Vince Johnson, and Bob Ferreira.
"If I Only Had a Brain" is one of my favorite songs (along with just about all of the Wizard of Oz Songs), and the Costello/Frisell and Four Freshmen versions are very nice, but I still prefer the versions from the movie. There are several clips of Dorothy's meeting with Scarecrow, but all the really nice ones seem to have had embedding disabled, including this longer dance sequence, which wasn't included in the 1939 release. After much searching, I finally found a video that includes the scenes scattered through the movie in which Dorothy meets Scarecrow, Tin Man, and The Cowardly Lion and the latter two reprise the song with new lyrics: "All-In-One".
Here's the 1939 trailer to the movie.
I love the way the trailer references Baum's books, making it very clear that in 1939 the movie was very much a tribute to the books and the books were widely read. This contrasts with my impression that for later generations, such as my own and more recent ones, the movie serves as most people's primary introduction to Oz, and many people never read any of the books, or perhaps only the first.
I was very fortunate as a child to come across several of Baum's Oz books (as well as his Life and Times of Santa Claus) in the El Paso Jewish women's club (whose official name I don't remember and wasn't able to find online) annual book fair. The book fair was a spectacular event for book lovers, in which the El Paso Coliseum (big enough to house indoor rodeos and seat over 5,000 people) was filled with tables stacked high with books. We had access to shopping carts and brown paper grocery bags; a grocery bag full of books cost a quarter. Some years later, the organization opened a book store and stopped holding the annual event; the books were priced much higher in the store and all the treasures were carefully screened. Perhaps this was better for the club, but for this book lover it was a very sad change.
Finally, here's one last video I stumbled across in my search, a "fake" trailer for a movie never made (or one which may be in production&emdash;the mentions I found were unclear or contradictory), Dark Oz , an adaptation of the Calibre Comics comic book series, Oz.
In honor of this post, I purchased a copy of the the "extended version" of "If I Only Had a Brain" from Amazon. (But, be warned, this version has only the Scarecrow's verses, and not those of the Tin Man or The Cowardly Lion.)
Totally unrelated to the rest of this post is an interesting article from Lisa Gold: Research Maven. Using the recent AP Stylebook recognition of the transformation of "Web site" to "website," she discusses the patterns of acceptance of linguistic change.