Showtunes and Mom's Influence

In mom's obituary we wrote that we, her children, were grateful for her introducing us to "show tunes, Tom Lehrer, Nichols and May, a love of nature, a lively exploration of ideas, and a compassionate inquisitiveness about the world."  I'd begun that phrase and Suzy and Jonathan added to it.  Now that I'm reading the fascinating Something's Coming, Something Good:   West Side Story and the American Imagination by Misha Berson, I want to come back to that phrase "show tunes" even though it wasn't Mom who introduced me to West Side Story.  (It's possible that I introduced it to her.)  Even before I discovered the 78 rpms albums for South Pacific and Oklahoma in the attic, I'd heard people sing-along to show tunes as Mom accompanied them on the piano (and sang along too).  Those show tunes included South Pacific, Oklahoma,  Showboat, Porgy and Bess, and Carousel.  She used to sing me  "I Love You a Bushel and a Peck" from Guys and Dolls.  Show tunes made it possible for me to move from fairy tales to MGM musicals, which my older sister Dana and I used to see both at the theatre in Blackfoot and at the State Hospital, where our father worked and patients saw in the big auditorium on Friday nights.  That was where Dana and I saw Singing in the Rain.  That was also where I saw a live production of Showboat, too--the first live musical I can remember seeing.  "Only Make-Believe" is a song we heard our father sing too.  Even though their marriage was NOT a magical musical, I'm grateful to them both for the sing-alongs that made me believe that when I fell in love, it would be expressed in our singing and dancing down the street, even in restaurants, he would whisper into my ear, "When you're near the murmuring of the breeze becomes a symphony.  A rhapsody."  Granted I didn't have the words quite right.  (Remember how we got the word Mondegreen from "Lady Mondegreen," the way "and laid him on the green" was heard?)

Another example of that was "With a Song in My Heart."

"Heaven knows its importance to me" was what I heard for "Heaven opens its portals to me."

Close enough!  The point it, I knew how to make sense out of the sounds I heard, thanks to my parents.
("With a Song in My Heart" was from a 1929 Rodgers and Hart musical, Spring is Here  But I think my parents had a 78 rpm record by Mario Lanza or Tony Martin from a later era.)

More later...Much more 'cause this is important!