Fascinating: Pop Meets the Classics. A list of pop tunes using bits (or more than bits) of classical music.

I remembered the shock of recognition the first time I heard The Toys' "Lover's Concerto" on an "oldies" radio station - that's probably one of the most striking ones, as the tune is pretty directly lifted from the Bach piece.

(I suppose it says something about me, a child of the 70s, that she recognized that the Toys borrowed from Bach rather than hearing the Bach later and going, "gee that reminds me of...")

I also knew about Stranger in Paradise being lifted from Borodin. (Poor old Borodin; he's pretty much only known these days from that and also from "Kismet").

And Elvis (or rather, his songwriters) borrowed HEAVILY. It's fascinating to see how many well-known Elvis songs have classical roots. ("Wooden Heart" I TOTALLY get as "Muss i' Denn." I think I realized that long before I saw this site). (And they don't even have on there that "Love me Tender" was borrowed from the folksong "Aura Lee"). I was never particularly an Elvis fan, but I have to say, I look at him in a bit of a different light now realizing how many of the songs he performed had classical roots...and you know, it makes sense, for someone who promoted a somewhat bombastic and emotional style, to use a lot of bits from opera and elsewhere.

There are also the songs that lift bits for "effect" - Procul Harem's "Whiter Shade of Pale" has some Bach bits inserted into it (despite their denials), and several songs use the "Entrance of the Gladiators" (a/k/a "Circus Music") for effect. And Sting's use of the bit from Lt. Kije in his "Russians" (I had forgotten that! But now it comes back to me.)

The one that surprised me - and I'm kind of trying to sing it over in my head now, and it makes sense but isn't obvious - is Perry Como's borrowing of a German folksong drinking song from Brahms' "Academic Festival Overture" (one of my favorite pieces) for "Catch a Falling Star." The melody fits but like so much of Como's stuff it's slowed down to the speed of flowing molasses; I suppose that's why I never made the link.

I don't know about you but this kind of thing interests me - partly because I'm pretty good at recognizing musical influences or recognizing tunes. (Which can be very amusing - or very annoying - considering how some advertisers just randomly use "ok, this sounds good" music without thinking about the words involved - or they randomly rewrite and so you get things like Target using a reworked version of "Baby Got Back"* for a back-to-school ads without apparently any reflection on how wildly inappropriate it is).

(*You know - you SHOULD know, I do and I'm about as unpopmusic as they come - it's the one that starts off: "I like big butts and I cannot lie....")