The Ear Gremlin
Chatty’s "adopted mum" Tonia came to visit this past week. It was a wonderful few days.
Tonia is currently performing in a show she has created based on three major influences in her musical life – Maurice Chevalier, Jacques Brel, and Edith Piaf. Maurice Chevalier was Tonia’s uncle; Jacques Brel judged her in a singing contest in Brussels when she was 14 and a few years later declared her to be the only WOMAN who could sing his songs the way he wanted them to be sung; and Edith Piaf was very encouraging to Tonia when she was just young and starting her career. Tonia has created a wonderful show to pay tribute to all three.
But this is all just by way of giving you a "heads up" about The Ear Gremlin…
The Wiz was making a few copies of Tonia’s latest demo CD, because many people have expressed interest in booking her at their venues; but making copies entails listening to the performance several times. One particular snippet of a song kept resonating from a Piaf song Tonia sings in her show:
"....All the chapel bells were ringing
in the little valley town..."
Well, The Wiz went around humming it, and that’s when The Ear Gremlin jumped forth to plague us.
The Wiz couldn’t get the tune or the lyrics out of his mind. And soon, neither could Chatty. He hummed it in his SLEEP a couple of times, for Pete’s sake! Chatty didn’t have a chance.
Chatty has always been susceptible to The Ear Gremlin. Once, she went around singing "Jingle Bells" for a week in July, for no other reason than that she had been in a Christmas mood one evening and had put on some seasonal music to assuage her longing for snow and good cheer *sigh*.
Her most embarrassing Ear Gremlin to date, though, is the time she got an old (and she’s talking OLD here) Playtex jingle stuck in her ear that went:
"My SEAMless isn’t SHAPEless anYYYYmore".
Truly distressing, especially as Chatty would WITHOUT WARNING (to herself or others) burst forth with this ditty while walking down the street. Chatty got looks, many of them not very polite - and more than a few that concentrated on her bosom.
Chatty figured there was no "fix" for this gremlin problem, so she dealt with it in the usual way – by blushing and ducking when caught out.
But a few weeks ago, someone told Chatty that you can hold The Ear Gremlin at bay if – as soon as you start parroting a song – you IMMEDIATELY sing "The Star- Spangled Banner", which is a complicated song and takes concentration to maneuver.
It works! You don’t even have to sing it out loud (which quite frankly would probably garner as many stares from passers-by as inappropriate holiday music or a Playtex jingle). No, you just have to sing it to yourself, and that will do the trick.
Chatty passes this along as a public service, because she is ALL ABOUT serving her public.
Categories: Silly Stuff,Helpful Hints,The Wiz,Random Observations
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