Meredith Wilson's "Rock Island"

While writing that last post about instrumental emulations of train sounds, I got thinking about Meredith Wilson's "Rock Island" from The Music Man again.  In the post I wrote about that (where I incorrectly referred to it as "Rock Island Line," and which I've since fixed), I noted that the song is "set to the rhythm of the train they’re riding in," but I didn't really expand on that.

But after thinking about how other songs did it, I realized that at least part of how Wilson's song emulates a train is the sound of the words.

Cash for the merchandise
Cash for the button hooks
Cash for the cotton goods
Cash for the hard goods
Cash for the fancy goods
Cash for the soft goods
Cash for the noggins and the piggins and the frikins
Cash for the hog's head, cask, and demijohns
Cash for the crackers and the pickles and the flypaper 

Each line's starting with "cash" provides the sound of the train's engine getting started - the onomatopoeic chugging of the train.  Also, as the later lines are longer, you start to get the feeling that the train is picking up momentum.

There are other ways in which the song emulates train sounds, but I think this is one of the most important.

Meredith Wilson's "Rock Island"

Two days ago, I listened to the soundtrack to Meredith Wilson's The Music Man.  I kept thinking about it, and I realized something interesting about "Rock Island."

Near the end of the song, there's the lines

No, the fellow sells bands, boys bands, I don't know how he does it, but he lives like a king and he dallies and he gathers and he plucks and he shines.

(I'm not even going to try figuring out where the line breaks should be.)

In between "I don't know how he does it" and "but he lives like a king," there's a pause in the lyrics for maybe half a measure.  I'd grown so used to that pause that it was only after stepping back and wondering why it's there that I realized how important it is.

The song occurs near the beginning of the movie (apart from the main title, it's the first number), and it serves the purpose of introducing the audience to Harold Hill via what the other travelling salesmen say about him.  A good deal of the lyrics illustrate that the other salesmen are dubious about Hill's selling.  Later in the movie, the audience learns that Hill sells instruments, instruction books, and band uniforms before skipping town; he never actually teaches the band to play or leads it.

The salesmen's uncertainty and wariness about (and even aggressive dismissal of) Hill is certainly present in the lyrics, but it's also present in that pause.  Its presence after the line "I don't know how he does it" shows that the other salesmen can't figure it out.  It's as if they need to stop in the middle of what they're doing and ruminate about it.  Furthermore, the sudden lack of lyrics in a song that's otherwise pretty fast-paced and very meter-conscious (it's set to the rhythm of the train they're riding in) imparts a discomfort associated with the idea of Hill's selling.  Listening to the song, you get the feeling that's something's missing there, in the same way that there's something lacking in Hill's veracity.