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Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC?

Posted by: portenopete 12:38 pm EST 12/07/13

In "How Can Love Survive?" Max sings the line "Plenty of nothing you haven't got".

I have always taken it as a reference to PORGY AND BESS, but is it likely that Austrians in 1938 ('39?) would have been so familiar with it to share a joke like that?

I suppose if he is in the Ministry of Culture it's not that crazy.

Or was "plenty of nothing" (or "plenty o'nuttin'") an expression before the opera?


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And if we're going down that route:

Posted by: ADFeldman 05:26 pm EST 12/07/13
In reply to: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC? - portenopete 12:38 pm EST 12/07/13

The English puns in "Do-Re-Mi" don't make any sense if everyone is "actually" supposed to be talking and singing in German. We're clearly not meant to take all of it literally.

Best,
Adam


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re: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC?

Posted by: MFeingold (feinpress@earthlink.net) 04:52 pm EST 12/07/13
In reply to: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC? - portenopete 12:38 pm EST 12/07/13

Europeans - Austrians included - might not have been familiar with PORGY AND BESS as a complete work, but Gershwin songs, including the major songs from PORGY, were immensely popular all over Europe.

Don't know how true this is, but Ira Gershwin says in LYRICS ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS that, when the Nazis occupied Denmark, the Danish radio stations would follow the official Nazi news broadcasts with instrumental versions of "It Ain't Necessarily So."


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re: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC?

Posted by: PlayWiz 08:46 pm EST 12/07/13
In reply to: re: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC? - MFeingold 04:52 pm EST 12/07/13

Yay for the Danes, whose King at one point insisted that he and all his subjects wear the yellow star so the Nazis couldn't tell who were the Jews in Denmark, saving many lives.

That "It Ain't Necessarily So" story sounds wonderfully subversive!


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I'm guessing .....

Posted by: jdm 12:55 pm EST 12/07/13
In reply to: Another lyric question in SOUND OF MUSIC? - portenopete 12:38 pm EST 12/07/13

Plenty of nothing existed before Porgy & Bess

and .... if it is an inside joke from R&H, it is directed to those seeing the musical and not the Austrians in the show! :-)

Jim (avoiding yard work)


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