Tuesday, September 2

 

Look carefully: they've got Roman collars on. From the Father Ted TV series.

Eighties Song Parody Ahead

Okay, here and only here: a revision of Jefferson Starship's We Built This City in honor of early music enthusiasts about the struggle between a capella music and choral-orchestral works. Yes, I know, I am a sick, sick man. Eighties Pop and Palestrina...yikes. Blame my father, he listens to it in the car. Starship, I mean. I don't listen to anything written after 1764.

We Built this Chapel
by Vatican Starship (formerly the Sistine Choir)


From their album Knee-Bent in the Pope-la, which also features the Missa super Cyndi Lauper à 6.

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones
Built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.

Say you don’t know Condé, or recognize Des Pres,
Say you don’t care who does L’homme armé
Knee-bent at the altar, Venice’s sinkin’ in the night,
Too many Turks gone and beaten up your fight,
Gabrieli plays the bombard, listens to continuo, don’t you remember:

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones
Built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.

Someone’s always playing Odhecaton strains,
Who cares, they’re always changing those instrumentation names:
We just want to sing here, knock those sackbuts off the page,
They call us a capella, while modal Ionians stole the stage,
Alfonso’s on organistrum, Praetorius likes continuo, don’t you remember:

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones
Built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.
It’s just another Sunday, in a Papal church,
Haugen has the chokehold, and we just got the lurch,
Who counts the notes spaced along the bar,
Who wrecked our organ and replaced it with guitars?
Don’t tell us you like us, we’re just antiphonals
Looking for Palestrina, scholas, not just schools,

(Uncomfortable silence when they realize they don’t have any orchestral backup)

(Uhh…I’m looking out over that Pont Sant’ Angelo on another gorgeous sunny
Sabbato and I’m seeing bumper to bumper pilgrims!)

Don't you remember (remember)
(Here’s your favorite camerata in your favorite pizzicato city,
The city by the Tiber, the city that prays, the city that never sleeps).

Vittoria does falsetto, we don’t use continuo, don’t you remember,
We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.

We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones
Built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.
We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones.
We built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones
Built this Chapel, we built this Chapel on polyphones...

(fade out).

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?