Mondegreens

          You are familiar with mondegreens although you may not know them by that name (I didn’t until a couple years ago). Essentially, they are misheard lyrics. The origin apparently comes from a column by a 1950s journalist. She recounted hearing a Scottish folksong in her youth with the line “they have slain the Earl of Morray and laid him on the green.” She heard the line as “they have slain the Earl of Morray and Lady Mondegreen.” You can see how it happened. Growing up, unless lyrics were included with the record I had to depend on my ears and experiences or maybe reluctantly buy an issue of Tiger Beat where lyrics were sometimes published (although upon reflection, whoever listed them seemed no better at it than me. To my rather unsophisticated teenage sensibilities sometimes lyrics didn’t seem to have meanings. Some of those lasted til I was a senior citizen.

            Here’s few of my favorites. Most of these never occurred to me, I heard other people say them or read about them:

“Scuse me while I kiss this guy” instead of “scuse me while I kiss the sky”

“You and me and Leslie” instead of “you and me endlessly” (I love this one. Maybe if I’d known what a menage a trois was I’d have heard this one, too)

“There’s a bathroom on the right” instead of “there’s a bad moon on the rise” (I heard a story that John Fogerty liked this one so much he would sometimes sing it in concert)

“I know your Daddy’s insulting” instead of “I know your Daddy’s a sultan” (I once was at a concert when Maria Muldaur sang it that way, the audience loved it. Our singer sang it that way ever after)

            There’s lots more, I’ve even seen web pages devoted to mondegreens. Just thought I’d toss out the word.