Karin Seager Cockram
Last month, President Joan Larson opened the fifth regular meeting of the 2023-24 Shakespeare Club at the Lakeshore Center for the Arts in Westfield with 16 members in attendance.
Karin Seager Cockram gave her presentation entitled “Music Inspired by Pets.”
Composers throughout the ages have been inspired by a wide variety of subjects, from nature to love to religious fervor to social justice. For this paper, though, the love of pets is the main theme. From Mozart’s pet starling, Vogelstar, inspiring classical music during the 1700s to Dhani Harrison’s 2017 release of “The Dog Song,” composers have written about their love of pets in all genres and during all ages.
Dolly Parton sang a country ballad about her dog Cracker Jack. The eleventh of Edward Elgar’s “The Enigma Variations” was written for a friend’s dog, Dan. Freddie Mercury of the rock group Queen paid tribute to his favorite cat, Delilah, in a song bearing her name on the Innuendo album. Swedish musician Emil Sjogren, composed Lieder music for his little hound, Donnie in the mid 1800s. George Harrison honored his friend Eric Clapton’s Weimaraner with the song, “Jeep.” And who knew that the Beatles’ “Martha, My Dear” was about a dog?!
The list of composers is endless. This paper also covered the songs and styles of Laurie Anderson, Bradley Nowell, Chris Stapleton, Frederic Chopin, Paul McCartney, Red Hot Chili Peppers (specifically the pets of Flea and Anthony Kiederis), Neil Young, Giuseppe Domenico Scarlatti, Norah Jones, David Gillmour of Pink Floyd fame, Henry Gross, Maurice Ravel, Robert Plant, and George Crumb. Of course, it would be silly to present a paper on songs inspired by pets without including probably the most popular, easily identified song about pets ever written. Although this song was not inspired by a specific pet, it may be the song that inspired the most pet adoptions in history.
Written by Bob Merrill in 1952 and first recorded by Patti Page in 1953, “The Doggie in the Window”“has been sung by many, many artists during the past 75 years. Pets not only inspire music but art, literature, sports teams, and drama. But the most important aspect of life inspired by pets in unconditional love — for them and from them.
