Rawhide (song)
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Rawhide (English for raw skin ) is the title song of the US western series of the same name , which was broadcast by the television station CBS from 1959 to 1966 and ran for 13 episodes in Germany in 1965 under the title Thousand Miles of Dust . The interpreter of the original version was the singer Frankie Laine . The play was in many versions gecovert , including for the film Blues Brothers . Similar to (Ghost) Riders in the Sky and the theme song of the TV series Bonanza , Rawhide is one of the best-known and most interpreted crossover pieces from the field of Western music .
history
Rawhide was created in 1959 as a commission for the TV western series of the same name. The music was composed by Dimitri Tiomkin , a 1925 in the US emigre Russians , who already for a number of Hollywood -Erfolgsfilmen ( Mr. Smith Goes to Washington , Noon , Lost Horizon ) , the soundtrack had written. The text came from Ned Washington , a songwriter who is also in high demand in the film industry and who has worked with numerous stars, musicians and producers - including the Marx Brothers , Billie Holiday , Bing Crosby and the Disney Studios . Frankie Laine, the original interpreter of the song, was known as a versatile performer who included both classic crooner ballads and bluesy pieces in his repertoire. In addition, Laine had already made a name for himself as an interpreter of well-known Western film songs - among others with the pieces High Noon (Do Not Forsake Me) and 3:10 To Yuma .
Rawhide's lyrics are kept simple. In an idealized form, he addressed the hardships associated with a cattle drive as well as the thoughts and hopes of the cowboys involved - in particular the longing for their loved ones and the anticipation of seeing them again. The song initially had only mediocre success. Although it made it into the US and UK top ten in 1959 , it did not make it to number one. Even so, the song soon became popular. One factor in this was certainly the unusually long duration of the series. Laine himself made other versions over the course of his career. In the mid-1960s, some instrumental recordings of the piece in the surf sound - among others by Ventures and Link Wray - ensured that the melody was further spread . Entry into the repertoire of rock - and pop music held Rawhide with Blues Brothers - a popular become film from 1980. The main impetus here: the associated with the film song version of the band appearing in the movie The Blues Brothers .
Cover versions
Over the years, Rawhide has become a classic of the cowboy song and one of the few really popular western music pieces that made a lasting crossover into the pop music repertoire. The iTunes Music Store listed a three-digit number of different recordings at the end of 2012. In addition to orchestral recordings of the TV series theme (including by the London Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the orchestra of its original composer Dimitri Tiomkin), there are a cappella versions of vocal formations , rock and pop variants ( Liza Minnelli , The Jackson Five ) and Numerous country covers , including Sheb Wooley , one of the actors in the series, Johnny Cash and western swing interpreter Kata Hay . The Lively Ones and, more recently, the Los Straitjackets formation played other surf instrumental variants . Punk , folk punk , metal , psychobilly and indie rock formations also regularly included the piece in their repertoire. Examples are Dead Kennedys , The Meteors , Sublime , the Finnish metal band Ensiferum and the German metal formation Dezperadoz .
The song was also picked up by artists from the fields of electronic music , hip-hop and ska . In 2007 the sampling artist Jamie T recorded a version that was heavily alienated in terms of both melody and rhythm . In 1997 the formation Ministry of Ska released an instrumental version in the Ska style. The British folk punk band The Men They Couldn't Hang mixed the piece into a medley with the equally well-known cowboy song (Ghost) Riders in the Sky on their first album in 1985 . The folk singer Danno coupled the theme on his album The Next Time Around 2001 with a well-known calypso song - the Banana Boat Song by Harry Belafonte . The two singers and entertainers Jan Rot and Marjolein Meijers recorded a Dutch version of Rawhide in 2008 under the title Yippieyayee .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b Frankie Laine: 1913–2007 / Pop singer sang “Rawhide” theme , Claudia Luther, San Francisco Chronicle (online edition), February 7, 2007 (engl.)
- ^ "Rawhide": US entertainer Frankie Laine has died , Spiegel Online , February 7, 2007
- ↑ Text translation into German at outtalimits.de ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , accessed December 27, 2012
