Monday, September 20, 2021

Circus Circus #MusicMovesMe

It's that time of week again!

It's time for Music Moves Me!

Who are the Music Moves Me bloggers? We are bloggers who blog about music each Monday and if you have music to share with us, you are most welcome to join! (Music Posts Only-meaning at least one music video, please!)   First, there is XmasDolly. (She's back, hurray!)  Her co-hosts are: Stacy of Stacy Uncorked, Cathy from Curious as a Cathy, and me. 

Each month we have a guest conductor. Today, we welcome once again our guest conductor (and all around wonderful person) Cathy from Curious as a Cathy.  Cathy has picked as our theme for this week: You Pick.

I've been having a lot of "blog writers block" lately, so I decided to do some random browsing.  I came up with this tune, which is familiar, I think, to most of us.  What I never knew was its name.  The music is associated with circuses, but the name of the piece is....wait for it...


Entry of the Gladiators.(I've also seen this called "March of the Gladiators" and Entrance of the Gladiators..)  This piece dates from 1897, was written by a Czech composer, Julius Ernest Wilhelm Fučík, and was meant as a military march.

Gladiators?  I don't think the Roman circuses used anything like this theme music when it was gladiator time, but I guess, in some way, you could connect gladiators with circuses.  My spouse, who is into Ancient Romans, explained to me that there would also be entrances of the lions, tigers and bears (we won't go into why they were there, but let's just say it wasn't pretty) into the circus arena.  So, I looked for an online history of this march and sure enough, there is one.

Hearing this song immediately made me think of this 1974 Three Dog Night song called The Show Must Go On. 

Yes, the Beatles had a circus oriented song.  From Sgt. Peppers album, "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite".

Smokey Robinson and Tears of a Clown.

One for the hard rock fans in the audience.  One of my favorite songs, KISS and Psycho Circus. OK, not a true circus, but it has circus in the name and "carnival" in the lyrics.

Last but not least is this Afro Circus Clip from the movie Madagascar 3, where we circle back to our opening song.

Boys and girls of all ages, that's a wrap.

Join me again next week, same time, same place!


 

7 comments:

  1. ...Tears of a Clown is my favorite.

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  2. Alana,

    For someone suffering from Bloggers' Writing Block, you do a swell job. :) I liked your theme and song picks for freebie week. Now, I want cotton candy! Have a boogietastic week, my dear!

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  3. That The Beatles one is a strange one. I instantly thought of Leon Russell's Tight Rope when I read "circus" songs. Circus sure were something different back in ancient Rome!

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  4. MOL...We love Madagascar, what a purrfect end of a great mewsic tour😸Pawkisses for a Happy Weekend🐾😽💞

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  5. "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" is my favorite song on "Sgt Papper."

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  6. Loved em all- except for Kiss. (NOT into Hard rock at all!) And, I'm guessing I missed Madagascar since my kids are now adults.

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