My grandma rides a motorcycle in the chicken coop

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The joke song My grandma rides a motorcycle in the chicken coop is popular with children and adults alike and is sung in many different versions. It was possibly created as early as the 1930s as a mixture of two different, older hits : The refrain of the Rhinelander We drunk our grandma's little house , which Robert Steidl wrote in 1922, forms the template for the melody, with Steidl in turn giving this melody part to the trio Part of the song Die Holzauktion (around 1890) borrowed from Franz Meißner . The text, on the other hand, is based on the Foxtrot My Grandma Rides a Motorcycle, Without Brakes, Without Lights (1928) by Ernst Albert (text) and Erwin Bolt (music).

Rhythm and melody

The text passages "My grandma drives ..." each time begin with a sixth as a distinctive step upwards, followed by two tetrachords downwards. The energy of these eighth notes initially flows into the three-fold "motorcycle" motif , consisting of a swaying third down. After repeating the text passage "My grandma drives ..." the melody gradually rises in eighth notes to the final keynote of the key.

Sources and text variants

The German Folksong Archive in Freiburg im Breisgau has extensively researched the origins and impact of the song. "It is a reflection of the playful enjoyment of the absurd and at the same time a typical and virulent example of those songs that develop parallel to the media-influenced musical culture of the 20th century and are constantly changing with a certain dynamic of their own." The exact date of origin of the mixed version is not yet known. In 1935/36 the text incipit can be found for the first time in a magazine. The oldest incipit available to the German Folk Song Archive dates from 1942.

Version from 1958

My grandma drives a motorcycle in the chicken coop first appeared in print in 1958 in the song book The Ignition Key from Fidula-Verlag, based on the memory of the editor Johannes Holzmeister.

1. My grandma drives a motorcycle, motorcycle, motorcycle
00in the chicken coop , my grandma drives a motorcycle in the chicken coop,
00my grandma is a very smart woman.

2. My grandma has a radio in her hollow tooth ...

3. My grandma has a chamber pot with lights ...

4. My grandmother is bald with a railing ...

5. My grandma has glasses with curtains ...

6. My grandma has a pet [t] icoat made of corrugated iron ...

7. My grandma has a revolver in her garter belt ...

8. Because my grandma plays a cowboy in Hollywood ...

Version from 1980

Fredrik Vahle published in 1980 in the song sparrow , a version with 25 verses , the grandmother of the time according to behind the steering wheel sits Tagesschau looks and into the disco goes.

WDR version

Counter-demonstration in Cologne in January 2020 against a rally on the occasion of the "Umweltsau" video.

In 2019, the Westdeutsche Rundfunk Köln (WDR) recorded a new version with the WDR Children's Choir of the Dortmund Choir Academy entitled “My Grandma”, which was created by an author from the WDR-2 editorial team and “with exaggeration and humor the conflict between the Targeting Generations ”should. This version was published as a video on Facebook on December 27, 2019.

After criticizing the text ("My grandma is an old environmental pig ...") it was removed a short time later "to protect the children"; Copies of the video are still available on YouTube. Among the critics was the North Rhine-Westphalian Prime Minister Armin Laschet ( CDU ). He wrote that the song “exceeded the limits of style and respect for the elderly. To instrumentalize young against old "is" unacceptable. "In a WDR special broadcast on December 28, the station's director, Tom Buhrow , apologized for the video" without ifs and buts "and described it as a" mistake ". Program director Jochen Rausch said that they had not given enough thought to “linguistic subtlety”.

Rally of mostly right-wing participants on January 4th with the performance of the rapper "Master Spitter"

The chairman of the German Association of Journalists called the allegations that children had been instrumentalized for the recording "absurd and malicious", and the deletion of the video was "not smart" and "unfortunate".

In a statement, choir director Zeljo Davutovic referred positively to the Fridays for Future movement, which started out by children and young people, and emphasized: "It's not about grandma, it's about us all". He apologized to all those “who felt personally attacked despite being classified as satire”.

On December 29, 2019, according to estimates by observers, between 100 and 200 people demonstrated in front of the WDR building in Cologne against the station and the performance of the song. According to the police, right-wing people were also among the participants. There were also rallies in front of the WDR Arkaden on January 4, 2020. Around 1,500 counter-demonstrators opposed the approximately 35 demonstrators from the right-wing and right-wing extremist spectrum.

Web links

Wikibooks: Songbook / My grandma rides a motorcycle in the chicken coop  - learning and teaching materials

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Eckhard John, Renate Sarr: My grandma drives a motorcycle in the chicken coop (2008). In: Popular and Traditional Songs. Historical-critical song lexicon of the German Folk Song Archive
  2. ↑ Gerd Eckert : hit texts little changed. In: Der Türmer : German monthly books. Die Bergstadt , Volume 38 (1935–36), Part 2, ZDB -ID 501058-5 , pp. 87–89, here p. 88 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  3. ^ Version from 1958 , in The ignition key
  4. ↑ Version from 1980 , in Liederspatz
  5. ↑ Anna Ernst: "I did not expect this extent to begin with". Süddeutsche Zeitung of December 29, 2019, accessed on January 14, 2020.
  6. ↑ WDR 2 Comedy Children's Choir: “My grandma is an old environmental pig” in HD 720p on YouTube
  7. ↑ And then Tom Buhrow calls on the special. In: The world . December 28, 2019, accessed January 14, 2020 .
  8. ^ Vitus Studemund: Riots at demonstrations in Cologne because of satirical video. In: AiXformation - News from Aachen. January 4, 2020, accessed April 20, 2020 .
  9. ↑ WDR apologizes for satire with children's choir. Deutschlandfunk , December 28, 2019, archived from the original on January 1, 2020 ; accessed on January 14, 2020 .
  10. ↑ "Umweltsau" -Satire: choir director defends himself - "neo-Nazis" swear in front of the WDR. In: Frankfurter Rundschau . December 29, 2019, accessed January 14, 2020 .
  11. ^ Controversy over the "environmental pig" video demonstration in front of the WDR in Cologne. Deutschlandfunk , archived from the original on December 29, 2019 ; accessed on December 29, 2019 . Why a children's song about "Grandma Umweltsau" causes a stir. Der Standard , December 29, 2019, accessed December 30, 2019 . The indignation machine is running hot. Spiegel Online , December 30, 2019, accessed December 31, 2019 .
  12. ↑ According to WDR satire, hundreds of people demonstrate against right-wing rallies in Cologne. Kölner Stadtanzeiger , January 4, 2020, accessed on January 4, 2020 .