Esoteric Bowl

This morning when I woke, I had that familiar feeling of knowing that I had been dreaming only moments before. Lying still in the darkness, I slowly gathered my thoughts. The substance of the dream was long gone, and all that I was left with was a single word; tulips.

Tulips? What in the world was I dreaming? Frankly, two-lips would be much easier to decipher from a dream. Suddenly, visions of purple tulips appeared in my head, then yellow and orange, all in an open field as far as I could see. A lovely image, but I was convinced that a field of tulips was not in my dream.

Then an image of the past appeared. It was Tiny Tim of Tiptoe Through the Tulips fame. Wow, where did that image come from? Although I had long forgotten about Tiny Tim, he apparently remained somewhere in the corners of my mind.

I lost interest in trying to figure out the dream, thinking instead about Tiny Tim. As best as I can recall, Mom and Dad bought God Bless Tiny Tim as somewhat of a joke for my brothers and I when we were little. Tiny was rather big at the time, in a unique and faddish kind of way. The album was Tiny’s first, and from what I can remember it was actually quite entertaining.

I went online to see if any of the songs from the album were available for free download. Surprisingly, they are. Hearing the songs after all this time was both evocative and novel. While the falsetto vocal and accompanying ukulele on Tulips is Tiny’s lasting sound, lesser known songs on the album are wonderfully produced, displaying his impressive vocal range along with charming melodies and a lovely orchestra.

In listening to the album in my youth, I didn’t realize that many of the songs were from another era. Then I’d Be Satisfied With Life was written by George M. Cohan. Stay Down Here Where You Belong is an anti-war song written by Irving Berlin. Tiny’s versatility shines in the delightful turn-of-the-century song On the Old Front Porch, singing a trio with himself. And Fill Your Heart was written by then unknown songwriter Paul Williams.

As I continued to search the web for any present-day information about Tiny, I discovered that his version of the song Livin’ in the Sunlight, Lovin’ in the Moonlight was included in the SpongeBob SquarePants pilot episode. I also learned that Tiny Tim died from a heart attack nine years ago today on November 30, 1996.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 30th, 2005 at 1:03 pm and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.