Category Archives: Musical

Jump, Shake Your Booty

Nationality: American
Age: 17
Occupation: Student
Residence: Norfolk, Virginia
Performance Date: 4/28/13
Primary Language: English

My informant has been a dancer since elementary school, and currently dances with her performing arts high school. She told me the following piece of folklore about a pre-performance tradition:

So, after everyone gets ready and is about to go onstage for opening night before a show, everyone like gets together in a big group, and usually we turn off the lights but not always depending on where we are, but we usually turn off the lights, and then we all like get in a circle and its quiet for a few seconds and then sort of spontaneously it starts, we all start like shouting JUMP SHAKE YOUR BOOTY, JUMP JUMP SHAKE YOUR BOOTY and we all jump up and down and shake our butts along with the chant, and I guess it’s for good luck on opening night, I’m not really sure, but, like, we all do it before opening night and I’ve done it at, like, pretty much every show I can remember.

My informant told me she and the other members of her cast would perform this tradition for good luck before a show. She does not know when or where it began, but said it has been around for as long as she can remember. Although my informant is a dancer, she said many of her other friends in other disciplines celebrate this tradition as well, and it appears to be a long standing theatrical tradition across all disciplines. It could be a way to get the cast excited before the show, and to loosen up through the motions in the chant, or simply a way to remind everyone to have fun and enforce comradeship in the cast.

The Following Home

Nationality: Iranian
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: 4/26/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Farsi

My informant provided the following story/rhyme as something his grandmother would recite to him before school, which she drew from her Iranian heritage and knowledge of Persian folklore:

Alright so “The Following Home” is one that my mom’s mom, my grandma, told me in childhood. Growing up both of my parents worked and my grandma took care of me a lot, so I would spend the night often, and every morning before I went to school (I think it was either pre-school or kindergarten) uh, I, she and I would say this poem together, and the poem is kind of like, it describes a morning ritual that a child does before he goes to school, and in Farsi it goes like this:

Mamani mamani mamani joon. Chai ra bezar
ro fenjoon. Vakhti ke chai ra nooshidam,
mamani ra boosidam, miram koodakeshan
Shadam o khamdan, shadam o khamdan

what the poem is saying is, it says: “grandmother, grandmother, grandmother, dear. put the tea to steep, when I drink the tea and kiss my grandma I go to preschool with laughter and joy, with laughter and joy.” So it’s a very positive way I guess to get your children to go to school and drink their morning tea, and that’s basically it.

As it is a children’s rhyme, it makes sense that it is uplifting, and is a happy admonition to behave and go to pre-school obediently. It is likely designed to make the sometimes unpleasant activity of going to school more appealing, and my informant mentioned how he felt happier and willing to start his day cheerfully after reciting it with his grandmother. Indeed, he thinks one of the reasons he remembers it is that reciting it sticks out in his memory as an especially happy time with his grandmother and brings back pleasent familial memories.

Theater Circle Trust Rituals

Nationality: Caucasian
Age: 20
Occupation: USC Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: May 3, 2013
Primary Language: English

Ooh, high school drama productions would have a “circle” every night before shows. I feel like most schools or theaters or whatever have something like this. A communal thing to get everyone together and alleviate anxiety before a show. Let’s see. There were different ritual/game things every time, chosen from an established group (established, as the whole thing was, by past students. Everything passed down and taught to the freshman and sophomores and other newcomers so that the whole thing goes on). There’s one thing where everyone holds hands silently. One person squeezes the hand of the person next to them and then that person does the same so it goes around the whole circle. There’s another thing where an appointed person, usually a beloved clownish figure who retains the post until they graduate, is blindfolded. They then go around the circle and randomly select two people, who have to kiss. That one happens three times. There’s “Show us how you get down” or whatever it was called. Basically a call and response then dance thing.

“Hey Michael!”
“Hey what?”
“Hey Michael!”
“Hey what?”
“Show us how you get down!”
“What?…I don’t know…no way”
“Show us how you get down!”
“Ok!”

Then you’d proceed to do some kind of dance move or something while saying “This is how I get down.” Pretty much anything goes. Everyone then imitates it and then the person who just went calls the next person.
Then there’s senior speeches, where all the seniors talk about how much drama has meant to them and lots of people cry.
Aaaaaaand, yeah, that’s pretty much all I remember about that.

The members of the Drama Club are afraid to fail at performing their play, and so they ritualize those fears by forming a circle and participating in group games, dances, and songs to loosen up and gain comfort in the routine. By doing embarrassing dances beforehand, they can relax and not worry so much about embarrassing themselves on stage. Another big benefit is that the club members joining together to do embarrassing dances and awkward activities provides the club with a strong feeling of community. People learn to trust each other by breaking their comfort zone, and through passing on these Drama Club activities to newly initiated members. This trust makes the group tight-knit and able to work together to put on a play.

“Thirteen Days to Immortality”

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student, Camp Counselor
Residence: San Antonio, TX
Performance Date: April 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

             The informant explained that most schoolchildren in San Antonio are familiar with a song written about the Texans’ final days at the Alamo Mission, where a group of Texan military leaders and their troops resisted the Mexican army’s assault for thirteen days before they were all killed. The song, “Thirteen Days to Immortality,” is incorporated into theatrical performances of the Alamo, namely the Phantom of the Alamo. It is a popular feature at annual school performances and at local summer camps. She acknowledged that the author is unknown and, while the song is sung to a medley of musical tunes from other folk songs, she couldn’t identify which ones.She did, however, note that while her parents were familiar with the song during their childhood, her grandparents had never encountered it, suggesting that it is a fairly recent folk song that has emerged over the last two generations.

 

Oh! What a beautiful sunrise,
Day Twelve is a wonderful day!
Texans all gather together
To find out who all wants to stay.
Travis and Crockett, Jim Bowie
Lead the men over the line.
One man decides it’s not worth it,
It’s not his time yet to die.

 

On Day Thirteen. . .everyone died.
All of the heroes who fought on both sides.
Take down the flag, honor the dead, isn’t it sad.
Everyone suffers the loss for those are bad.
Take down the flag, take down the flag.

           

            The song is clearly a children’s song, akin to one you might see taught in a history class to aid children in memorizing historical facts. It is sung to a cheery tune, and there is a heavy emphasis on the collective loss shared by both parties during wartime: “Everyone suffers the loss.” Moreover, the lyrics also recognize heroics in both the Texan and Mexican troops, introducing the values of equality and honor in fighting for one’s land. “Thirteen Days to Immortality” presents perhaps a more sympathetic angle than the legend of the Alamo itself, which antagonizes the Mexican troops as the aggressors and looks unfavorably upon those who flee from death in battle (the lone Texan who abandoned the Alamo was left cursed to haunt the Alamo). Instead, the lyrics mourn the lives of the fallen, calling the deaths “sad” and the deserter is receives no negative attention at all.

            Both “Thirteen Days to Immortality” and the historical legend of the Alamo illustrate examples of war-related folklore or, in this case, folk history.  The song, in particular, relies on a lexicon of war-related vocabulary, namely “hero,” “honor,” and “flag.” In this way, outside of the song’s lyrical content, the vocabulary is recognizable as being related to war texts and literature.

 

Irish Songs

Nationality: American
Age: 19
Performance Date: April 2013
Primary Language: English

“The vocal section of the song is really short,  so that you can sing along, and the music section is really long so you can drink and dance in between.”

This folk belief is essentially based in the stereotype about Irish people: that alcohol, and drinking, are of the utmost importance.  This belief filters down to music, and to the belief that little eccentricities of Irish music, such as having short lyrical verses and long instrumental sections, are there for reasons of drinking, dancing, and other merriment.