Tribute to Thanksgiving Bangers
Thanksgiving Songs for Children
- Albuquerque Turkey
Nadine Knight
Thanksgiving Song by:
Mary Chapin Carpenter
Alice's Restaurant - Original 1967 Recording
Welcome to a new feature where Let’s Talk About the Music steps away from the current independent music industry to pay homage to the legacy of music from the past. Today’s musicians owe their presence to those who came before them, paving the way.
Thanksgiving bangers
I once saw a meme that read something along the lines of this: “People always complain about Christmas music being played before the Christmas season, but I don’t hear anyone writing any Thanksgiving bangers.” That made me wonder: Are there actually any Thanksgiving-themed songs? Let alone “Thanksgiving bangers”?
There was a children’s song I remember from school called “Albuquerque Turkey” set to the tune of “Oh Clementine,” about a boy who has a turkey for a pet. And somebody I know commented that “Hotel California” by the Eagles is a song about Thanksgiving. He listed off various reasons defending his theory that I can’t offhand remember, other than that the lyric, “They stab it with their steely knives, but they just can’t kill the beast,” refers to killing and cooking a turkey. But, to be serious, let’s try and track down some actual “Thanksgiving bangers.”
The first interesting item I came across concerned a classic song we first heard in elementary school. “Over the River & Through The Woods” is meant to be about Thanksgiving. Granted, I never gave it much thought, and am not sure I bothered memorizing anything beyond the first couple of lines.
The song was originally written as a poem. Entitled “The New England Boy’s Song About Thanksgiving Day,” it was written by Lydia Maria Child in 1844. You can probably hear the song in your head and imagine a choir of schoolchildren singing it; but if you’re curious what an acoustic version of the song would sound like, indie performer Nadine Knight has one. Incidentally, Nadine Knight has many other song covers on her YouTube page and is currently working her way to becoming a full-fledged artist.
But let’s dig a little deeper. That song is pretty standard and well-known, so now let’s try to find something more original. The YouTube channel World Top Rate has a video entitled “The Top 10 Pop Songs For Thanksgiving.” Entries include “We Are Family” by Sister Sledge, “Thanks For My Child” by Cheryl Pepsii Riley, and “Thank You” by Dido. Most of these entries are fairly generic pop songs about family or being thankful for something—which does go hand in hand with Thanksgiving—but they do not seem like they were specifically written for the holiday. (Although to be fair, there are plenty of Christmas songs that weren’t originally intended to be Christmas songs.)
The only two direct Thanksgiving pieces are “The Thanksgiving Song” by Adam Sandler, and… um… “Thanksgiving Song” by Mary Chapin Carpenter. (Seriously, why are there two Thanksgiving songs called “Thanksgiving Song”?) The latter song at least feels a bit more like a traditional holiday song, while the Sandler one is typical Adam Sandler.
But my goal is to find a “Thanksgiving banger.” I wanna find a song I can tap my toes to bop my head to make me wanna get up and dance (but probably still wouldn’t ‘cause I hate dancing). Someone recommended “Alice’s Restaurant” by Arlo Guthrie to me, which is a satirical piece about an incident that happened in Guthrie’s life on Thanksgiving. It’s… amusing, but I wouldn’t call it a song, as it’s really more like a comedic monologue that a beatnik would recite in a café.
That said, I think I did finally find a genuinely comical, catchy Thanksgiving ditty. It is simply entitled “The Turkey Song (Except For The Turkey)” and is written by Bryant Oden, who has written other holiday songs as well as the popular meme “The Duck Song.” Originally from Oklahoma, Oden has made a pretty good living writing songs which at first sound like they are strictly for kids; but his songs also have a clever edge that I think adults can thoroughly enjoy, as evidenced in “The Turkey Song.” You can find more at his website and his official YouTube channel.
Here you’ll find plenty of humorous songs that I think could put a smile on anybody’s face. Well, except for the turkey….
Happy Thanksgiving!
The Turkey Song
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