The Anacreontics
of Popular American Music
by Francine DuBois
and Hillary Hardcore
Most popular for poems he himself did not write, Anacreon (a.k.a. Anakreon),
a sixth century BCE poet of Greece, popularized odes to erotic love
and alcohol. These two themes have certainly lasted through the centuries,
finding a particularly notable home in American popular culture.
The remains of Anacreon's work are fragments, yet his legacy is undeniable.
His work praising a hedonistic, comfortable life and the physical pleasures
of sex, love, and drunkenness inspired Ben Johnson, Robert Herrick and
other carpe diem poets, Lord Byron, and arguably even comedians
such as W.C. Fields and Benny Hill. Though a clear line of influence
may be impossible to draw, the connections between Anacreon and modern
Western humor and literature are easy to infer.
Despite his lack of surviving works, Anacreon's gift to culture lived
on through other poets. A collection of works known as the Anacreontea
was published in sixteenth century France; however, it was not until
the eighteenth century that Anacreon's authorship was realized to be
in error. Instead of being his own work, the Anacreontea is a
collection of poems in honor and imitation of Anacreon. The popularity
of these poems and their themes of wine and women made Anacreon a sort
of cult hero, placing him as the honoree of the British drinking song
"To Anacreon in Heaven," which served as the melody for Francis
Scott Key's "The Star-Spangled Banner," clearly and forever
linking Anacreon's name with the United States.
In the Anacreontea, it is Ode 14 that speaks most clearly to
our American popular music tradition. Bernard Knox's modern translation
harkens closely to a pattern found in numerous songs:
If you can count the number
of the leaves on all the branches,
or if you can find the total
of the waves in all the oceans,
I'll appoint you the sole recorder --
you can catalog my love life.
Now for Athens, just to start with,
write down the number thirty
and fifteen more for completeness.
After that, for Corinth, check off
love affairs in runs, in series
(for that city's in Achaea
where the girls are always handsome.)
Then take down the score for Lesbos,
moving on towards Ionia
via Caria and Rhodos--
and the total now: two thousand.
And so the speaker continues to tour the Mediterranean, visiting Syria,
Egypt, Crete, and mentions that his love affairs span past the Rock
of Gibraltar and all the way to India's shores. "What's the matter?
Feeling dizzy?" the persona smugly asks.
It is unlikely that today's readers would get disoriented from reading
Ode 14; the cataloging of lovers around the world is quite a familiar
motif in American popular music, frequently in songs simply called "Girls,
Girls, Girls."
One of the first such instances appears in "The Merry Widow,"
a Rodgers and Hart musical from 1934. The lyrics to "Girls, Girls,
Girls," written by Lorenz Hart, quickly summarized the two major
themes of Anacreon's work:
Let us gaze in the wine while it's wet.
Let's do things that we'll live to regret.
. . .
When there's wine and there's women and song
It is wrong not do something wrong!
"Girls, Girls, Girls" here lacks the specificity of the world-traveling
lover, as it does in Elvis Presley's "Girls, Girls, Girls"
(from the movie of the same name).
Girls, big and brassy,
Girls, small and sassy,
Just give me one of each kind.
. . .
I'm just a red-blooded boy
And I can't stop thinking about
Girls! Girls! Girls! Girls!
A tour of the United States, much like Anacreon's follower's tour through
the Mediterranean, is the sole topic of the Beach Boys' 1965 hit "California
Girls" (covered in 1985 by David Lee Roth with great success, likely
bolstered by the bikini model-saturated music video).
Well East Coast girls are hip,
I really dig those styles they wear.
The Southern girls, with the way they talk,
They knock me out when I'm down there.
The Midwest farmer's daughter
Really makes you feel all right.
And the Northern girls, with the way they kiss,
They keep their boyfriends warm at night.
Although all have their assets, the best girls are in California, or
so the song states. It's the old Manifest Destiny theme, a jingoism
mixed with sexual pursuit, which permeates "California Girls."
"Yankee girls ya just can't beat," claimed Mötley Crüe
in 1987. They also took a musical tour of the United States, visiting
not vague regions, but strip clubs, in their song titled, of course,
"Girls, Girls, Girls."
Girls, girls, girls
At the Dollhouse in Fort Lauderdale
Girls, girls, girls
Rocking in Atlanta at Tattletails
Girls, girls, girls
Raising hell at the 7th Veil
Here the two themes of Anacreon become intertwined again: drink and
sex. While alcohol is not specifically mentioned, it is a certainty
based on the locations mentioned within the song.
Anacreon's tradition has found a home not only in operettas, teen musicals,
and glam metal, but also in hip hop and rap. In 2001, Ludacris and Nate
Dogg released "Area Codes," a cataloging of area codes and
a boisterous claim that "I've got hoes in different area codes."
Again alcohol is mentioned, keeping Anacreon's 2600-year legacy alive.
Also in 2001, Jay-Z released his song entitled, yet again, "Girls,
Girls, Girls." Jay-Z returns to the Anacreontic tradition of women
around the world, including Spain, India, France, Peru, China, and Africa.
Jay-Z revises Anacreon's appreciation of alcohol for substances a bit
more "ghetto":
Got a project chick that plays her part
. . .
Hid my drugs from the narcs, hid my guns by the parts.
. . .
Got a chick from Peru that sniff Peru
She got a cousin at customs that get shit through
Got this weedhead chick . . .
Would Anacreon be proud of his lasting tradition? No one can say, but
to deny his place in influencing culture, particularly American popular
music, would be a tremendous oversight.
The pursuit of sex and slight drunkenness was not the invention of
Anacreon, but it was his mastery of the subject matter that has launched
centuries of its celebration in poetry. His poems, had they survived
in their entirety, would likely fit right in with current trends. Despite
all our technological advancements and scientific enlightenment, our
growing cultural awareness and attempts to change social order, the
theme of "whiskey 'n' wimmen" (to borrow a phrase from John
Lee Hooker) still resonates. The forms haven't changed, the words have
barely changed. Anacreon lives.
Works Cited
Beach Boys. "California Girls." The Beach Boys Today!
EMD/Capitol, 1965.
Hart, Lorenz. "Girls, Girls, Girls." The Merry Widow.
Dir. Ernst Lubitsch. Perf. Maurice Chevalier and Jeanette MacDonald.
MGM, 1934.
Jay-Z. "Girls, Girls, Girls." The Blueprint. UNI/Def
Jam, 2001.
Knox, Bernard, trans. "If You Can Count the Number." The
Norton Book of Classical Literature. Ed. Bernard Knox. New York:
1993, 245-46.
Ludacris. "Area Codes." Rush Hour II Original Movie Soundtrack.
UNI/Def Jam, 2001.
Mötley Crüe. "Girls, Girls, Girls." Girls,
Girls, Girls. UNI/Beyond, 1987.
Presley, Elvis. "Girls, Girls, Girls." Girls, Girls,
Girls. Dir. Norman Taurog. Paramount, 1962.
