Rainy-Day Uke-Song: "VANCOUVER'S ISLE" per the Irish Rovers Band

 PARODY-LYRICS with UKULELE CHORDS

ORIGINAL SONG: "Black Velvet Band" traditional Irish pub song, as arranged by the Irish Rovers 1967. Of note, the Irish Rovers' 50th and putatively final tour took place 2 years ago, ending with concerts in Vancouver and Nanaimo BC on St. Patrick's Day.

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, January, 2018. To view the lyrics without the chord-charts, proceed to our blog "Edifying Nonsense" HERE.
SONGLINK: Check out an earlier posting on this site entitled "Singable Limerick-Medley#3: A Visit to Chemainus, B.C."

Rainbow over Ladysmith Harbour
  brief break from several days of intense rain.

The IRISH ROVERS ended their 50th world
ANNIVERSARY TOUR with a concert in Nanaimo B.C.

VANCOUVER'S ISLE

(to the tune of "Black Velvet Band")

*  A.C. = Air Canada. Westjet is a competitor on flights across the country. Porter provides more local service from Toronto Island Airport to destinations in Eastern Canada and the East Coast of the U.S. 

Chemainus: shuh-MAY-nuhs

Nanaimo: nuh-NIE-moh

Mexican Uke-Song: "CLOTHING MOTHS", in the Style of Allan Sherman

Allan Sherman
1924-1973

Singable Satire
ORIGINAL SONG: "Mexican Hat Dance" (spoof) Allan Sherman, 1963. The original music, based on traditional Mexican dance-forms from the central and southern part of the country, is also known as "Jarabe Tapatío"; the music, unaccompanied by lyrics, is a typical repertoire item for mariachi.  

LIMERICK VERSE:  Two original poems composed by Giorgio Coniglio, 2017-2018, provided the fodder for these song lyrics. The verses have now been finalized and published at the OEDILF website (the Omnificent English Dictionary in Limerick Form). They can be found more readily on the post "Limericks about Clothing Moths" on our sister blog "Edifying Nonsense".

A mariachi band
Kensington Market, Toronto
August 2018.

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, August 2018. 

SONGLINK: The melody and lyrical adaptation for Mexican Hat Dance were used previously by G.C. as the base song for "Dante's 'Inferno' Canto#5a: MINOS'S TAIL TWIST".

UKULELE-FRIENDLY FORMAT (and guitar, too!)

(Click on any chord-chart slide to move to 'song-presentation mode'; then navigate through thumbnails at the bottom of the page.)

ORIGINAL SONG-LYRICS

WORDPLAY LINK: 

For wordplay (palindromes, anagrams, eggcorns, creative cartography, etc.) and silly poetry (polished limericks), see our sister blog "EDIFYING NONSENSE" here.

Byzantine Uke-Song: "CONSTANTINOPOLIS"

SONG with UKULELE CHORDS

ORIGINAL SONG: "Moscow Nights"(Подмосковные вечера,  Podmoskovnie vechera), Chad Mitchell Trio, 1963. You can listen to the Trio's well-known  version on YouTube here, or a version with English translation here.
The original was created as "Leningrad Nights" by composer Solovyov-Sedoi and poet Matusovsky in 1955, but changed at the request of the Ministry of Culture for use in a documentary about a national athletic competition. The tune was subsequently popularized in the West, in the middle of the Cold War era, by Van Cliburn in 1958, and recorded with commercial success by Kenny Ball and the Jazzmen, and the Chad Mitchell Trio in the early 60s. 

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, August 2018.  To view the lyrics without the chord-charts, proceed to our blog "Edifying Nonsense" HERE. You will also find further discussion of the history of Constantinople and other matters.

SONGLINKS: This post deals with Graeco-Roman history during the Byzantine period. Another song dealing with Greek history, culture and travels is found in an earlier blogpost as  "Singable Limerick Medley #15: Travels in Greece". This entire effort was inspired by "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)", a swing-era hit with a very catchy tune whose lyrics are a bit truncated re history.

CONSTANTINOPOLIS

(to the tune of "Moscow Nights")

UKULELE-FRIENDLY FORMAT (also banjo, mandolin, guitar etc.!)

(Click on any chord-chart slide to move to 'song-presentation mode'; then navigate through thumbnails at bottom of page.)

Specifics for C-tuned ukulele:
Am7 = 0000;  Dm7 = 2213;  E7 = 1202;  B7 = 1211 

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*  the prediction was made by the Seer early in the fourth century A.D.
Byzántion (Greek), later known as Byzantium (Latin) was at that time a moderate-sized Greek colony-city on the Bosporus. It was chosen by the Roman Emperor Constantine to become the eastern capital of his empire.
As capital of the Roman Empire (also called Romania), the grand city was known as Constantinopolis, or Konstantinoupolis, for most of its history, i.e. until 1453 A.D. (later as Istanbul by the Turks). The term 'Byzantine Empire' has only been in use by Western historians since that time.

ORIGINAL SONG-LYRICS
(click on any song-chart to enlarge and proceed to thumbnail mode)