New Horizons in Schlager Appreciation, Episode 3

In 1999, when I was a professor of music theory at Big Plains State U., I was asked to teach a class called Music Theory for Non-Musicians. After a unit on motivic uses of rhythm, I asked my students to choose a short passage from a favorite piece and present it to the class. One student brought in "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and said, "in order to understand today's music, you need to understand the classics."

With this dictum in mind, I introduce you, dear readers, to Jan and Kjeld Wennick's 1959 Schlager hit, "Banjo Boy," which reached the number one spot in the German Hitparade and spent 29 weeks in the Top 40. Not bad for two young brothers from Denmark.

As is the case with other Schlager songs we have encountered thus far, "Banjo Boy" is cheerfully nostalgic for an exotic land far, far away ("Tennessee"). It includes some geographically ambiguous twangs that perhaps sound more tropical than suth'n or country, but what the heck, Other is Other, right? There's also a fine trumpet lick that alludes to the long jazz tradition that, um, Tennessee is so famous for. Yodeling would be semiotically inappropriate given the lyrics, but Jan and Kjeld never seem too far from their European roots. Enjoy!

Jeden Abend geht er durch die Strassen
In der kleinen Stadt in Tennessee,
Und die grossen und die kleinen Leute
Kennen alle seine Melodie...

[Every evening, he walks through the streets
in the little town in Tennesse,
and the big and the little people
all know his melody...]

Sing ein Lied, sing ein Lied,
Little Banjo Boy
Banjo Boy, Banjo Boy.
Denn Musik, denn Musik,
Little Banjo Boy,
Banjo Boy ist unser Glueck.

[Sing a song, sing a song,
little Banjo Boy,
Banjo Boy, Banjo Boy,
for music, for music,
little Banjo Boy,
Banjo Boy is our happiness.]

So ein sing sage dige dage
Sing song unterm blauen Himmelzelt
Ist das sing sage dige dage
Sing song Allerschoenste von der Welt

[So a sing-saga-digga-dagga-
sing-song under the blue tent of the sky
is the most beautiful sing-saga-digga-dagga-
sing-song in the whole world.]