The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins
- The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins
"The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins" is a song composed by Charles Randolph Grean and performed by Leonard Nimoy, telling the story of Bilbo Baggins and his adventures in J. R. R. Tolkien's novel "The Hobbit". The recording originally appeared on "The Two Sides of Leonard Nimoy" (Dot Records Cat. DLP 25835, 1968), the second of Nimoy's albums on Dot Records. It was also released as a single (Dot Records Cat. #45-17028), backed with a "modern thought-image" folk song called "Cotton Candy".
A year before the recording was commercially released, Nimoy lip-synched to the recording during a guest appearance on the July 28, 1967 episode of "Malibu U", a short-lived variety television series. This segment survives as a "music video" and shows Nimoy (wearing his ' hairstyle as the series was in the midst of production of its second season at the time) and a group of color-coordinated young women, all wearing plastic elf (or Vulcan) ears, singing and dancing on a beach. Since its rediscovery on the BBC2 documentary "Funk Me Up Scotty" and propagation over the Internet, it has become a relatively well-known example of 1960s camp. An excerpt from the musical number is also included in the documentary ' about "The Lord of the Rings" fandom.
Fans of Nimoy were intrigued by the fact (revealed in interviews) that Nimoy had read Tolkien's "The Lord of the Rings" and been exceedingly impressed by it. From approximately 1968 to 1973, several Nimoy and Star Trek fanzine writers and editors (notably Regina Marvinny's "Nimoyan Federation") discussed the idea of a live-action "The Lord of the Rings" film, with Nimoy playing Aragorn, and there was a brief letter-writing campaign.
References to the song
*An audio clip of the song was played as part of a question on an episode of "Jeopardy!" aired January 5, 2006.Fact|date=February 2007
*The video was also a feature on VH1's "Web Junk 20".Fact|date=February 2007
*The song was sampled by Bentley Rhythm Ace for their track "Theme From 'Gutbuster"' on their album "For Your Ears Only", released in 2000.
External links
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFR-8NVjw-k&NR=1 The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins] on YouTube
* [http://youtube.com/watch?v=mPh12Q7cpeE Uncut version (in black and white)] on YouTube
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