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"Inchworm", also known as "The Inch Worm", is a song originally performed by Danny Kaye in the 1952 film Hans Christian Andersen . It was written by Frank Loesser.
| | This article needs additional citations for verification .(May 2021) |
"Inchworm", also known as "The Inch Worm", is a song originally performed by Danny Kaye in the 1952 film Hans Christian Andersen . It was written by Frank Loesser.
The song's lyrics express a carpe diem sentiment, with the singer noting that the inchworm of the title has a "business-like mind", and is blind to the beauty of the flowers it encounters:
Subsequent verses include the lines "Measuring the marigolds, you and your arithmetic / You’ll probably go far" and "Seems to me you’d stop and see / How beautiful they are"
Loesser wrote a counterpoint chorus that, sung by itself, has become popular as a children's song because of its arithmetical chorus:
In the film, a children's chorus sings the contrapuntal "arithmetic" section over and over inside a small classroom, dolefully and by rote, while Andersen, listening just outside, gazes at an inchworm crawling on the flowers and sings the main section of the song. Loesser loved the intellectual challenge of such contrapuntal composition, which he also did in other works such as Tallahassee. [1]
The composer received a fan letter (signed pseudonymously, "Your respectfully, a Kansas inchworm") which said of the song:
...It is simple, yet it is so intricate, the harmony is perfect and the counterpoint — well it just gives me a headache when I think of what it would be like to try to write it...
Loesser was so touched by the letter that he placed a large advertisement in the largest newspaper in Lawrence, Kansas — the Daily Journal World— in thanks. His correspondent wrote again, revealing herself to be teacher Emily Preyer. [1] [2]
Inchworm has been recorded by many singers, including Paul McCartney, Rachelle Ferrell, The Brothers Creeggan, Anne Murray, Kenny Loggins, We Five, John Lithgow, Mary Hopkin, Doris Day, Dan Zanes, Kurt Wagner, Lisa Loeb, The Sandpipers, and Patricia Barber. Performed instrumentally, it was a regular feature of the John Coltrane Quartet's repertoire and appears on the album Coltrane .
David Bowie said [3] the song was the inspiration behind his 1980 song "Ashes to Ashes":
Ashes To Ashes wouldn’t have happened if it hadn’t have been for Inchworm. There’s a nursery rhyme element in it, and there’s something so sad and mournful and poignant about it. It kept bringing me back to the feelings of those pure thoughts of sadness that you have as a child, and how they’re so identifiable even when you’re an adult.
Danny Kaye was an American actor, comedian, singer, and dancer. His performances featured physical comedy, idiosyncratic pantomimes, and rapid-fire novelty songs.
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