Lyrics That Send You to the Dictionary
Noah Webster, 1823, Samuel Morse
It's National Dictionary Day commemorating the birthday of lexicographer Noah Webster. Has a word in a lyric ever had you searching your brain or the dictionary for its meaning?
Here's what we spun just after 9am:
- Isaac Hayes - "Hyperbolicsyllabicsesquedalymistic" (vocab includes: modus operandi, phalanges, stupensity, asphyxiation, emancipator, cerebellum, medulla oblongata)
- The Decemberists - "June Hymn" (thrushes, panoply, barony)
- Steely Dan - "Bodhisattva" (bodhisattva)
- Andrew Bird - "Sisyphus" (precipice, recalcitrant, taciturn)
- Julie Andrews & Dick Van Dyke - "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" (precocious, atrocious)
Additional audio sampled from:
- Lance Crutthers as Pootie Tang, in conversation with Bob Costas - Pootie Tang (2001)
- "Hooked on Phonics" television commercial (1989)
Supported by The Public Theater, presenting 'GLASS. KILL. WHAT IF IF ONLY. IMP' from playwright Caryl Churchill.
