Song "Camp Granada"

[SactoTeddyBear]

Hey! Club Members and Friends, does anyone remember a Song called "Camp Granada" that a Comedian/Actor Sang?

The first part of the Song goes something like this.

"Hello Mother, Hello Father," here I am in Camp Granada...etc...

I was watching a Paid Commercial Show real early Thursday Morning about the Dean Martin Show and they had the person who Sang this Song in a background shot. The Comedian/Actor also had a Comedy person that he did Skits as,called "Maudie Fricket" and he would be dresses in Drag and had a Gray Hairpiece that he would were as that person.

The Comedian/Actor in question also kind of looks like Dom De Louise {sp} but it isn't Dom De Louise...

I would gratefully appreciate any and all info from those who "Remember When" Sit-Coms and maybe even any Movies that this person was in.

Peace and Kind Regards, Steve
SactoTeddyBear0503...

 

[112561]

Alan Sherman and Jonathan Winters

Alan Sherman sang "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah" and Jonathan winters did "Maudie Frickert/Fricket" whoever, never saw it printed out. They were extremely funny comedians in their time.

 

[turquoisedude]

I think....

It was a comedian called Allan Sherman. I remember the song well!

 

[aquarius1984]

This song always amuses me from The Simpsons.

to quote....

In 1995, the Simpsons featured this song in the episode Marge Be Not Proud. Bart Simpson uses the Camp Granada tape to replace the tape in the answering machine, prompting Homer to, after the first two lines, ask Marge if they'd sent Lisa to Camp Grenada.

Aways brings a smile to my face

 

[danemodsandy]

It's Called:

"Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (A Letter from Camp). It was a huge hit in Summer, 1963. The tune is "stolen" from a piece of very popular classical music, Amilcare Ponchielli's "Dance of the Hours."

Sherman was a comedian who specialised in parody lyrics to standard songs. Here's an example, where he took Harry Belafonte's calypso hit, "Mary Ann," and put new, comic lyrics to it:

"All day, all night, Cary Grant
That's all I hear from my wife
Is Cary Grant

What can he do that I can't?
Big star, big deal, Cary Grant!"

Or this one, to the tune of "Polly-Wolly-Doodle":

Oh, I diet all day
And I diet all night
It's enough to drive me bats!
Got no gravy or potatoes
'Cause the whole refrigerator's
Full of polyunsaturated fats!
Fare thee well, Metrecal
And the others of that ilk!
Let the diet start tomorrow
For today I'll drown my sorrow
In a double malted milk!"

And my personal favourite, based on "Down by the Riverside":

"When you go to the delicatessen store
Don't buy the liverwurst!
Don't buy the liverwurst!
Don't buy the liverwurst!
It'll make your insides awful sore
Don't buy the liverwurst!
Don't buy the liverwurst!
Oh, buy the corned beef if you must
The pickled herring you can trust
And the lox puts you in orbit A-OK!
But that big hunk of liverwurst
Has been here since September first
And today is the twenty-third of May!"

The lyrics to "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah" are:

"Hello Mudda,
hello Fadda,
Here I am at
Camp Granada.
Camp is very
entertaining,
And they say we'll have some fun if it stops raining.

I went hiking
with Joe Spivy;
He developed
poison ivy.
You remember
Lenard Skinner;
He got ptomaine poisoning last night after dinner.

All the counselors
hate the waiters,
And the lake has
alligators,
And the head coach
wants no sissies,
So he reads to us from something called Ulysses.

Now I don't want
that this should scare you,
But my bunkmate
has malaria.
You remember
Jeffery Hardy,
They're about to organize a searching party.

Take me home, oh
Mudda, Fadda,
Take me home, I
hate Granada!
Don't leave me
out in the forest,
Where I might get eaten by a bear.

Take me home,
I promise I will not make noise,
Or mess the house
with other boys,
O please don't
make me stay,
I've been here one whole day.

Dearest Father,
Darling Mother,
How's my precious
little brudda?
Let me come home
if you miss me,
I would even let Aunt Bertha hug and kiss me.

Wait a minute,
it stopped hailing,
Guys are swimming,
guys are sailing.
Playing baseball,
gee that's betta,
Mudda, Fadda kindly disregard this letta!"

 

[tomturbomatic]

The album was My Son the Folksinger (with a hard "G" so you should get the pronunciation right). The song ruined the Dance of the Hours from La Gioconda for me, well this song and the piece in Fantasia with the Hippos.

I went hiking with Joe Spivey; he developed poison ivy.

I noticed even as a kid that all of the names were uh, familiar, like family.

 

[danemodsandy]

Tom:

The lines:

"And the head coach
wants no sissies,
So he reads to us from something called Ulysses."

Are such a direct reference to "family" that I'm still amazed Sherman got away with it. If more parents had been better-educated, he wouldn't've.

 

[tomturbomatic]

Sorry, I was thinking family like Jewish, but the thing about Ulysses was pretty blatant. That's OK though, only the smart people got the joke, not the ignorant troublemakers. Many of them probably did not even know Ulysses from mythology. Remember Edith Hamilton?

 

[112561]

Allan Sherman's Wikipedia Bio

Considering this is on Wiki, it's still pretty good.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allan_Sherman

 

[danemodsandy]

Tom:

The reason I was amazed about those lines was that there were more well-rounded people around in '63 than I see today. My dad was not college-educated (Mom was), but he was well-read, conversant with current events and knowledgeable enough to help any of his kids with any of their homework, in an age that didn't have the Internet yet. You wouldn't be as likely to find that today. We had the Encyclopedia Britannica (painfully paid for at so much a month, I'm sure), dictionaries, and shelves of classics from Twain to D.H. Lawrence.

Different time.

 

[SactoTeddyBear]

"WOW" What a lot of:

"Old-Timers" as well as "New-Timers" and already getting some great replies. Thank You one and all and also for all of the extra info shared for not only myself, but for others too.

I had forgotten the Slang way of pronouncing certain names, so I just did my basic remembering of who the beginning went and I figured that whomever was able to help out with the Comedian/Actors name would know the rest.

Now however, I'm confused about did Jonathan Winters actually Sing the Song, or was it Alan Sherman originally and perhaps the only one of those 2-Men?

Peace and Kind Regards, Steve
SactoTeddyBear0503...

 

[tomturbomatic]

Sandy, another factor in most of the country was that this song was on Top 40 stations and the more up tight adults did not listen to that music. Kids often had to listen to the stations on their transistor radios because their parents would not let "that kind of music" be played on a radio in the house.

Oh, yes books were important to many families. We had the World Book and both Britannicas and almost everything that Time-Life offered because we could not get to the public library during the week because mom did not drive. We also got lots of magazines--oh those appliance ads in the 50s and 60s.

 

[112561]

Allan Sherman sang the song "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah," and many others. Jonathan Winters was never known as any kind of singer. LOL

 

[sudsmaster]

I remember that song well when it came out.

But I could never quite understand the complaining. To me, getting out of the city to a summer camp would have been heaven.

 

[ronhic]

Here we go

something funny...

 

[jeffg]

Sherman did a lot of stuff that was edgy for the time. My favorite is a song called Sir Greenbaum's Madrigal. It's about a Jewish knight (funny because the whole Camelot/Knights of the Round Table thing was Christian, not Jewish).

Anyway here are the lyrics:

Sir Greenbaum's Madrigal
(Allan Sherman)

In Sherwood Forest
There dwelt a knight
Who was known
As the righteous
Sir Greenbaum

And many dragons
Had felt the might
Of the smite
Of the righteous
Sir Greenbaum

I chanced upon him one morn
When he'd recently rescued a maiden fair
"Why, why art thou so forlorn?
Sir Greenbaum, is thy heart heavy laden?"

Said he, "Forsooth
'Tis a sorry plight
That engendered my attitude bluish"
Said he, "I don't wanna be a knight
That's no job for a boy who is Jewish"

All day with the mighty sword
And the mighty steed and the mighty lance
All day with that heavy shield
And a pair of aluminum pants

All day with the slaying and slewing
And smiting and smoting like Robin Hood
Oh, wouldst I could kick the habit
And give up smoting for good

And so he said to the other knights,
"You may have my possessions and my goods;
For I am moving to Shaker Heights
Where I've got some connections in dry goods"

Farewell to the dragon's paw
And the other swashbuckling games and sports
I'll work for my father-in-law
When I marry
Miss Guinevere Schwartz!"

 

[ptcruiser51]

My two cents of trivia

There was also a board game put out called "Camp Granada", following the song's popularity. Allan Sherman appeared in the TV commercials advertising it.

 

[nurdlinger]

Steve,

If you want a good idea of what Jonathan Winters was like, watch the old movie "It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World". He plays the moving van driver.

 

[abcomatic]

Classical music tune for Hello Mudda

HI all, The classic music tune for Hello Mudda is really "The Dance of the Hours." If any of you have ever seen the movie Fantasia, there is a section in the movie that has a hyppopotumus dressed in a tu tu dancing to the music. Have fun. Gary

 

[fltcoils]

Listening to it now

I was just listening to it "hello mudder"

Part of
The Very Best of Dr. Demento
collection

Amazon has "listen to sample" of this.

But I'm partial to some other cuts on this one.

 

[fltcoils]

Winters,

Jonathan Winters also plays a spy on "The Glass Bottom Boat". Another classic in so many ways.

 

[rp2813]

Rich, I think maybe Camp Granada is the classic case of a stereotypical Jewish boy not being cut out for roughing it. Just a wild guess.

I liked Sherman's spoof on "The 12 Days of Xmas" which highlighted the ridiculous consumer frenzy that the holidays had become. And that was nearly 50 years ago when holiday shopping wasn't the battleground it is today.

All together now: "... and a Japanese transistor Ra-di-OOOOOOO!"

 

[danemodsandy]

Another Sherman Classic:

This one to the tune of "Tit Willow," from the Gilbert & Sullivan operetta, The Mikado. Please note that the word "tit" and its variations in this context have nothing to do with anyone's poitrine:

The Bronx Bird Watcher

On a branch of a tree sat a little tomtit,
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow.
An uncomfortable place for a boidie to sit,
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow.
So I said to him, "Boidie, why don't you go way?"
He said, "Thenks very much, but I'm planning to stay.
I'm gone sit on that branch for the rest of the day,
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow."
So I said to him, "Boidie, you look so distraught.
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow.
You gonna be glad when you'll see what I brought.
A pillow, a pillow, a pillow."
I said, "Boidie, your pardon I humbly would beg.
Put this comfortable pillow right under your leg."
He said, "Leave me alone while I'm laying an egg.
Uh willow, tit willow, tit willow."
That night by the light of a matzoh ball moon,
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow.
That boidie was singing the same catchy tune:
Willow, tit willow, tit willow.
And I came, and I took him right down from his branch,
And I brought him back home to mine split-level ranch,
And I said to my wife, "Here's a gift for you, Blanche.
He sings 'willow, tit willow, tit willow.'"
Next morning I got up and went to the shop,
Singing willow, tit willow, tit willow.
That tune was so catchy, it just wouldn't stop.
Willow willow, titty willow willow, titty willow willow willow wil-LOW.
That night I said, "Blanche, how's the bird?" She said, "Well,
The boid was delicious, it tasted just swell.
But as I fricaseed him, he gave out a yell:
'Oy willow, tit willow - willow.'

 

[danemodsandy]

And Then There's...

...This one, sung to the tune of "Alouette." If you were around in the early '60s, the TV shows mentioned here will bring back some fond memories:

Al n' Yetta

Al 'n' Yetta always sit togedda,
Watching TV every single night.
Munching popcorn from a dish,
While observing Dorothy Gish.
(Dorothy Gish) Dorothy Gish,
(What a dish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al 'n' Yetta couldn't have it betta,
Their TV set has remote control.
So they both can stay in bed,
With Frankenstein and Mister Ed.
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al 'n' Yetta, fans of Art Linkletta,
And they love to sing along with Mitch.
They just found in TV Guide,
Reruns of December Bride.
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
They're big fans uh Gunsmoke and Bonanza,
And Ben Casey and Doctor Jim Kildare,
And third reruns of Millionaire,
And fourth reruns of Yogi Bear.
(Millionaire) Yogi Bear,
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al 'n' Yetta love to watch Loretta
When she enters through her fancy door.
They just love The Real McCoys,
Walter Cronkite and The Bowery Boys.
(Bowery Boys) Real McCoys,
(Millionaire) Yogi Bear,
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al got wrinkly, watching Huntley-Brinkley,
And College Bowl on Sunday afternoons.
While they both watch Meet The Press,
Yetta yearns for Elliott Ness.
(Elliott Ness) Meet The Press,
(Bowery Boys) Real McCoys,
(Millionaire) Yogi Bear,
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al 'n' Yetta watched an operetta.
Leonard Bernstein told them what they saw.
They both shouted, "Hail Bernstein!"
Then they switched to What's My Line.
(Hail Bernstein) What's My Line,
(Elliott Ness) Meet The Press,
(Bowery Boys) Real McCoys,
(Millionaire) Yogi Bear,
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish.
Ohhhh,
Al told Yetta something that upsetta.
He said, "Dear, our picture tube has blown."
Yetta answered, "Woe is me,
For tonight we shall not see:
(Hail Bernstein) What's My Line,
(Elliott Ness) Meet The Press,
(Bowery Boys) Real McCoys,
(Millionaire) Yogi Bear,
(December Bride) TV Guide,
(Mister Ed) Stay in bed,
(Dorothy Gish) What a dish."
Ohhhh,
Al 'n' Yetta's television set!

 

[danemodsandy]

And Lastly, There's...

...This one, in which Sherman took on Hava Nagila - and won:

Harvey and Sheila

Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
Oh, the day they met.
Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
No one will forget.
Harvey's a CPA.
He works for IBM.
He went to MIT and got his PhD.
Sheila's a girl I know,
At B.B.D.& O.
She works the PBX,
And makes out the checks.
Then came one great day when
Harvey took the elevator,
Sheila got in two floors later,
Soon they both felt they were falling,
Everyone heard Sheila calling,
"Ring the bell,"
But they fell.
Harv and Sheila fell in love.

Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
Chose a wedding ring.
Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
Married in the spring.
She shopped at A & P.
He bought a used MG.
They sat and watched TV
On their RCA.
Borrowed from HFC,
Bought some AT&T,
And on election day, worked for JFK.
Then they went and got a
Charge-A-Plate from R.H. Macy,
Bought a layette, pink and lacy,
Then they had twin baby girls,
Both with dimples, both with curls,
One named Bea,
One named Kay,
Soon they joined the PTA.

Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
Moved to West LA.
Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila, Harvey and Sheila,
Flew TWA.
They bought a house one day,
Financed by FHA.
It had a swimming pool, full of H2O.
Traded their used MG
For a new XKE.
Switched to the GOP,
That's the way things go.
Oh that Harvey he was
Really smart, he used his noodle.
Sheila bought a white French poodle,
Went to Europe with a visa,
Harvey's rich, they say that he's a VIP!
This could be,
Only in the USA!

 

[danemodsandy]

Wait, Wait!

Ooh - I found it. I found it! Allan Sherman's best ever. This one is set to "The Battle Hymn of the Republic," and it contains the biggest laugh Sherman ever got. I've italicised the phrase that made everyone roll on the floor:

The Ballad Of Harry Lewis

I'm singing you the ballad
Of a great man of the cloth
His name was Harry Lewis
And he worked for Irving Roth

He died while cutting velvet
On a hot July the 4th
But his cloth goes shining on

Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
His cloth goes shining on

Oh Harry Lewis perished
In the service of his Lord
He was trampling through the warehouse
Where the drapes of Roth are stored

He had the finest funeral
The union could afford
And his cloth goes shining on

Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
His cloth goes shining on

Although a fire was raging
Harry stood by his machine
And when the firemen broke in
They discovered him between

A pile of roasted Dacron
And some french fried gabardine
His cloth goes shining on

Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
Glory, glory Harry Lewis
His cloth goes shining on!