Topic: favorite theme music

[Shemp_Diesel]

I don't know if this has been done before, but I was inspired to ask this question after going through volume 8 earlier today. What is your favorite 3 stooges theme music? My favorite would have to be the slower rendition of "3 Blind Mice" that they started using in 1945 with If a Body Meets a Body, and my 2nd favorite after that would be the various renditions of "Mice" used from 1952 to 56.

 

[Dog Hambone]

 

My favorite is Listen To The Mockingbird from the early shorts, probably because it's so zany sounding. I don't recall when the switch was made to Three Blind Mice, I think it was around the time FLAT FOOT STOOGES was released. BeAStooge would probably know. 

[Shemp_Diesel]

Yeah, Flat Foot Stooges was the first short to use the "Three Blind Mice" theme & Three Little Sew and Sews was the last short to use "Listen to the Mockingbird".

[FineBari3]

I like the mice version that started while Curly was still in the group. It is the first one that uses the fast, swing ending. I believe there are a couple versions similar to that, going all the way to the end (just like Shemp_Deisel says!).

....Rich Finegan, here's your cue!

[Liz]

Three Blind Mice is my favorite, especially in the Shemp shorts.

[Rich Finegan]

I like the mice version that started while Curly was still in the group. It is the first one that uses the fast, swing ending. I believe there are a couple versions similar to that, going all the way to the end (just like Shemp_Deisel says!).

....Rich Finegan, here's your cue!

I think the swing version you mean is the one used for Stooges shorts released from mid-1944 to early 1945. That's what I also consider the "swingin-est" version.
Like some of the other pre-1947 versions of "Three Blind Mice" that one was arranged by Leigh Harline and Ben Oakland.

[FineBari3]

I think the swing version you mean is the one used for Stooges shorts released from mid-1944 to early 1945. That's what I also consider the "swingin-est" version.
Like some of the other pre-1947 versions of "Three Blind Mice" that one was arranged by Leigh Harline and Ben Oakland.

Yes, that is the one I like the the best! You are right; it is the swingin-est!

[Lefty]

My favorite was hands-down the speedy version from 1942 to early 1944.  When I wrote down all of the titles of the shorts in the 1970s, which is how I found out that there were 190 of them, I noted which episodes had that version of Three Blind Mice, and I had my tape recorder ready to catch it a couple of times.

[Dunrobin]

We need one of you talented people to capture each of the different opening themes as mp3s that we could feature in the Multimedia Gallery, along with which episodes used them.   

[Bum]

I find the 1945-47 version of "Three Blind Mice" depressing because I associate it with the "sick Curly" shorts. It's an amazing coincidence that the first short on which it was used [If a Body Meets a Body] also happened to be the first short where Curly is drastically different in appearance/voice/mannerisms. Even when I hear it on the first few Shemp films, it still makes me think of Curly struggling the previous two years. When the newer recording appeared on the fourth or fifth Shemp, to me it almost signals the close of a dark era and the beginning of a happy new one [the "classic Shemp" period].

[hiramhorwitz]

Although no doubt corny, the musical intro associated with the Besser-era gets my vote.  Something about the simple series of hellos always makes me smile. 

[Bum]

I was gonna mention liking the "Joe" theme in my above post, but didn't because I was too ashamed! Now that I know someone else likes it too........ I actually enjoy hearing the harp, because it was something never-before-heard in a Stooges theme. Truthfully, I'm kind of surprised at that late stage, that Columbia would pay for a new recording of the song!

[hiramhorwitz]

I was gonna mention liking the "Joe" theme in my above post, but didn't because I was too ashamed! Now that I know someone else likes it too........ I actually enjoy hearing the harp, because it was something never-before-heard in a Stooges theme. Truthfully, I'm kind of surprised at that late stage, that Columbia would pay for a new recording of the song!

Glad to hear I'm not the only "crazy!"

[TXShemp]

Hiram Horwitz: Forgive me, but I have to ask. Any relation to the famous Horwitz's?

[BeAStooge]

 - The 1939 "Three Blind Mice" orchestration with the Columbia fanfare intro
 - The 1944 - 1945 "Three Blind Mice" swing orchestration
 - HALF-SHOT SHOOTERS' (1936) "Listen to the Mockingbird" orchestration, combined with its 1-time fanfare intro

[Rich Finegan]

- The 1939 "Three Blind Mice" orchestration with the Columbia fanfare intro
 - The 1944 - 1945 "Three Blind Mice" swing orchestration
 - HALF-SHOT SHOOTERS' (1936) "Listen to the Mockingbird" orchestration, combined with its 1-time fanfare intro

I agree with you on all three!

[hiramhorwitz]

Hiram Horwitz: Forgive me, but I have to ask. Any relation to the famous Horwitz's?

I wish I could say yes, but have to admit the name's just a pseudonym.  When I was a kid, my dad playfully called me Hiram (it wasn't my name, just a nickname he picked at random).  Combining Hiram with Horwitz was an obvious choice (a bit of a tongue twister with Stooge heritage), so I went with it.  Hopefully, it isn't causing any grave-rolling for Shemp, Moe, or Curly!       

[Rich Finegan]

Hopefully, it isn't causing any grave-rolling for Shemp, Moe, or Curly!       

No, I'm sure they'd have been proud to have you as a relative!

[MR77100]

I find the 1945-47 version of "Three Blind Mice" depressing because I associate it with the "sick Curly" shorts. It's an amazing coincidence that the first short on which it was used [If a Body Meets a Body] also happened to be the first short where Curly is drastically different in appearance/voice/mannerisms. Even when I hear it on the first few Shemp films, it still makes me think of Curly struggling the previous two years. When the newer recording appeared on the fourth or fifth Shemp, to me it almost signals the close of a dark era and the beginning of a happy new one [the "classic Shemp" period].

I agree with you on that. it was VERY ironic that IF A BODY MEETS A BODY was the first short to feature the slow rendition, and was also first "slowed" Curly short.

[MR77100]

Yeah, Flat Foot Stooges was the first short to use the "Three Blind Mice" theme & Three Little Sew and Sews was the last short to use "Listen to the Mockingbird".

But for some odd reason, they went back to the "Listen To The Mockingbird" them for five more shorts befoe switching back to "Three Blind Mice."

[falsealarms]

I've always liked the earliest theme music (circa 1935), the theme music circa 1941, and the theme music circa 1952 ... the worst was the one used on the last Curly's and the early Shemp's.

[Woe-ee-Woe-Woe80]

My favorite Stooges theme song is the original Three Blind Mice used in the 1939-42 Stooge shorts, to me that theme song came out during Curly's Golden period and the majority of my favorite Curly shorts had that theme song, honorable mentions are "Listen To The Mockingbird" and the 1942-44 version of "Three Blind Mice"

My least favorite theme song is the 1945-early 1947 version of "Three Blind Mice", I always associate it with the sick Curly era and I consider that to be the sad era of the Stooge shorts, I also didn't care much for the 1944-45 version of "Three Blind Mice" either although I don't get why that theme song was short lived, that theme song has more of a Shemp era feel than a Curly era feel to it.

[Big Chief Apumtagribonitz]

Although I realize that it is in no way emblematic or representative of what the stooges ever acted like, I have always liked "I Thought I Needed You", the Men In Black opener.  The fanfare is good, and the orchestration is just so Hollywood.   It's like, welcome to your career, boys.  "My Life, My Love, My All" has the same feel: though neither theme stuck, they're exactly right for the moment.  To me they both say Presenting The Three Stooges.

[GOTBSB]

Mine would probably be "Mockingbird", just for how delightfully zany it is.

[Big Chief Apumtagribonitz]

I have a friend who is a very good trumpet player as well as a stooge freak.  He has listened very hard to the Mockingbird opener, and he opines that along with the muted trumpets, there is actually one guy singing "wah wahwah wahwah wah WAH".