{"id":12517,"date":"2013-01-02T13:29:15","date_gmt":"2013-01-02T18:29:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=12517"},"modified":"2017-07-13T10:36:57","modified_gmt":"2017-07-13T14:36:57","slug":"midweek-childhood-music-break-various-artists-sho-jo-ji","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2013\/01\/midweek-childhood-music-break-various-artists-sho-jo-ji\/","title":{"rendered":"Midweek (Childhood) Music Break: Various Artists, “Sho-Jo-Ji”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Stylized<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: stylized <\/em>tanuki, a\/k\/a Japanese raccoon dog, in the form of a <\/em>kumadori mask
\nfor use in <\/em>kabuki performance. (Thus: a <\/em>kabuki tanuki.) I found it here<\/a>, among a collection of other <\/em>kumadori.]<\/em><\/p>\nP<\/span>robably item #1<\/a> among my nascent collection of Maxims for Nostalgists<\/em><\/a> would go something like this:<\/p>\n

Not everybody shares your memories — in fact, few people do. But don’t write off your memories as lively (or misshapen) childhood inventions, either. The Internet tells us so.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Like many stories, the story behind today’s post is longer than the simple facts (or mere common sense) might indicate. I recently received a comment on one of my old (mostly two-part)\u00a0What’s in a Song<\/em><\/a> posts, the one about “Cry Me a River” (Part 1 of which was here<\/a>). In the course of replying to the comment, I got involved in re-reading what I’d already posted, checking the links and so on. Naturally, some of these — especially YouTube videos — had broken in the last three years, so I looked around for more current links to the same (or similar) content.<\/p>\n

Which got me looking back at the Julie London version of the Mickey Mouse Club<\/em>‘s sign-off song (“M-i-c, k-e-y…”). Suddenly, unbidden, a mini-avalanche of memories tumbled out of my subconscious, into the full light of awareness — all related to the songs on an old phonograph album, of music featured on the original TV series.<\/p>\n

One of the songs on this album was an odd little number partially in some Oriental language — Chinese, I thought, or maybe Korean. It was a song about (according to the English verses) a raccoon, a raccoon who was always hungry. And because he was always hungry he\u00a0sang<\/em> — in particular, he sang something which sounded like koink-koink-koink!<\/em> But that couldn’t be right, could it?<\/p>\n

A quick Google search led me straight to this post<\/a> by someone identified as Mama Lisa — and her many commenters. A gold mine of reassurance!<\/p>\n

Turns out that “Sho-Jo-Ji” wasn’t written for the Mickey Mouse Club<\/em> (as I’d assumed). It’s actually a fairly old Japanese children’s song, about a creature called a Japanese raccoon dog — or\u00a0tanuki<\/em>. The song made its appearance during the first season of the\u00a0Mickey Mouse Club<\/em>, in November, 1955 (too early for even\u00a0me<\/em> to have seen and remembered it from that source). This version doesn’t seem to be available in any commercial form (MP3, iTunes…), but I have found what is darned close to the version I remember (if not the actual thing). The specific signature touch I recall: the prolonged trilling\/warbling\/musical-free-association between verses.<\/p>\n