Daisy Bell


Daisy Bell


"Daisy Bell (Bicycle Built for Two)" is a song written in 1892 by British songwriter Harry Dacre with the well-known chorus "Daisy, Daisy / Give me your answer, do. / I'm half crazy / all for the love of you", ending with the words "a bicycle built for two". The song is said to have been inspired by Daisy Greville, Countess of Warwick, one of the many mistresses of King Edward VII. It is the earliest song sung using computer speech synthesis by the IBM 7094 in 1961, a feat that was referenced in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968).

History

"Daisy Bell" was composed by Harry Dacre in 1892. As David Ewen writes in American Popular Songs:

When Dacre, an English popular composer, first came to the United States, he brought with him a bicycle, for which he was charged import duty. His friend William Jerome, another songwriter, remarked lightly: "It's lucky you didn't bring a bicycle built for two, otherwise you'd have to pay double duty." Dacre was so taken with the phrase "bicycle built for two" that he soon used it in a song. That song, Daisy Bell, first became successful in a London music hall, in a performance by Katie Lawrence. Tony Pastor was the first to sing it in the United States. Its success in America began when Jennie Lindsay brought down the house with it at the Atlantic Gardens on the Bowery early in 1892.

The song was originally recorded and released by Dan W. Quinn in 1893.

In technology and popular culture

Computing and technology

  • In 1961, an IBM 7094 at Bell Labs was programmed to sing "Daisy Bell" in the earliest demonstration of computer speech synthesis. This recording has been included in the United States National Recording Registry.
  • In 1974, auditory researchers used the melody of "Daisy Bell" for the first demonstration of "pure dichotic" (two-ear only) perception: they encoded the melody in a stereophonic signal in such a way that it could be perceived when listening with both ears but not with either ear alone.
  • In 1975, Steve Dompier, member of Homebrew Computer Club, programmed an Altair 8800 computer to play Daisy as AM radio interference.
  • In 1985, Christopher C. Capon created a Commodore 64 program named "Sing Song Serenade", which caused the Commodore 1541 floppy disk drive to emit the tune of "Daisy Bell" directly from its hardware by rapidly moving the read/write head.
  • In 1999, a piece of computer software called BonziBuddy sang Daisy Bell if the user asked it to sing.
  • Microsoft's personal assistant, Cortana, may sing the first line of Daisy when asked to sing a song.

Films

  • In 1941 the Eton Boys starred in a short musical film performing the song including riding tandem bicycles
  • Science-fiction author Arthur C. Clarke witnessed the IBM 704 demonstration during a trip to Bell Labs in 1962 and referred to it in the 1968 novel and film 2001: A Space Odyssey, in which the HAL 9000 computer sings "Daisy Bell" during its gradual deactivation.
  • Oliver Reed sings the song "Daisy Bell" in the 1972 film The Triple Echo.
  • In Revenge of the Nerds (1984), Takashi (Brian Tochi) sings a Japanese version of "Daisy Bell" during his tricycle race against the Alpha Betas.
  • In Robots (2005), when Rodney fixes Bigweld during the slide scene, Bigweld sings "Daisy Bell"
  • In The Time Traveler's Wife (2009), Alba and her father Henry sing the song "Daisy Bell" in an attempt to stop him from traveling through time while he is still using a wheelchair from a recent accident.

TV

  • In the English sitcom Mind Your Language, season 1 episode 4 (All Through the Night), Mr. Brown and the students sing Daisy Bell whilst waiting for the caretaker Sid to unlock the classroom door.
  • Bender sings "Daisy Bell" during a montage of him and the Planet Express ship in Futurama's fourth-season episode, Love and Rocket, as an allusion to the film 2001.
  • A student choir sings "Daisy Bell" (with minor lyric changes) at the beginning of a bicycle race in the Midsomer Murders series 12 episode, "The Glitch" (2009).
  • In American Horror Story season 8, episode 10 (2018), the android recreation of Ms. Mead sings “Daisy Bell” in a slurred and distorted voice.

Musical recordings

  • Dan W. Quinn produced a wax cylinder recording of "Daisy Bell" in 1893, the first recorded rendition of the song.
  • Singer Dinah Shore recorded a version of the song for Bluebird Records in 1941.
  • Singer Nat King Cole produced the most well-known recording of "Daisy Bell" as part of his Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer LP for Capitol Records in 1961.
  • On May 3, 2014, an album was released composed entirely of covers of "Daisy Bell" entitled The Gay Nineties Old Tyme Music: Daisy Bell, in conjunction with Mark Ryden's exhibit "The Gay 90s". The album features covers of "Daisy Bell" by Katy Perry, Tyler, the Creator, "Weird Al" Yankovic, Nick Cave, Kirk Hammett of Metallica, Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo, Wall of Voodoo's Stan Ridgway, Danny Elfman, and others. Profits from the album went to the nonprofit Little Kids Rock.

Radio

  • The tune was played as the lead-in to Aunt Daisy's radio broadcasts in New Zealand, which ran from 1930 until her death in 1963.

Sport

  • Supporters of Feyenoord, the football club of Rotterdam, sing their chant "Wat gaan we doen vandaag?" to the tune of "Daisy Bell".

References

External links

  • Johns Hopkins University (30 March 2007). "Daisy Bell. Song". Levy Sheet Music Collection, Box 140, Item 090. Archived from the original on 19 April 2014. Retrieved 30 August 2012.
  • 1894 recording of "Daisy Bell" (MP3)
  • Page featuring a recording of "Daisy Bell" sung and played by IBM computers at Bell Laboratories in the early 1960s (see last track on side 2 labeled "Synthesized computer speech demonstration (1963)")


Text submitted to CC-BY-SA license. Source: Daisy Bell by Wikipedia (Historical)



 

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