This project actually began a decade ago. I don’t remember exactly what was going on in my life or what my thought process was at the time, but when I ran across the original post several months ago it struck me that I could do better. I hope I have achieved that goal. Like so many of my favorite topics I’ve written about in this space, these past few months have allowed me to take a trip down Memory Lane and do a bit of self analysis, understanding the fun little bits & pieces that shaped my childhood, youth, and adult years. Once upon a time I took pride in addressing the important issues, using this site as my own bully pulpit. That hasn’t completely changed, but it has evolved into more of a refuge from the gravity of our world. I retain very little interest in being divisive or dogmatic…most of the time. Don’t hold me to that in the future when I get fired up about a hot topic though. The bully pulpit isn’t retired, it’s just in storage and used sparingly. At any rate, you came here for the conclusion of our musical journey, and I shall provide. As always, if, for some odd reason, you have somehow skipped over the first nine parts of our countdown and landed at the end rather than the beginning, please go here to get caught up.

5 Meet the Flintstones (The Flintstones)

Meet the Flintstones

They’re the modern stone age family

From the town of Bedrock

They’re a page right out of history

Have a yabba dabba doo time, a dabba doo time

We’ll have a gay old time

WILMAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!

There is a fun little scene in the greatest Thanksgiving movie of all time…Planes, Trains, and Automobiles…in which extrovert Del Griffith goads uptight Neal Page into leading a bus full of passengers in a singalong. Neil’s choice of Frank Sinatra’s 1954 Oscar winning hit Three Coins in the Fountain is met with bewildered indifference, but Griffith saves the day with Meet the Flintstones. It’s an upbeat, big band song that everyone remembers, sure to lighten up even the grumpiest of moods. Meet the Flintstones, which was inspired by Beethoven’s The Tempest, wasn’t the original theme song for the show, but more than a half century later it’s the one we all know and love.

4 Good Ol’ Boys (The Dukes of Hazzard)

Just the good old boys

Never meanin’ no harm

Beats all you never saw

Been in trouble with the law since the day they was born

Y’all know that, despite hailing from West By God Virginia, I am not a country music fan. I prefer George Thorogood to George Strait, Kenny Loggins over Kenny Chesney, and Hall & Oates instead of Brooks & Dunn. Having said that, it is irrefutable that the legendary Waylon Jennings was a key ingredient in the success of The Dukes of Hazzard, which was probably my favorite pre-teen era show. Jennings had served as The Balladeer (i.e. narrator) in the 1975 film Moonrunners, on which the television program is based. He also wrote & performed the theme song, which reached #1 on the country charts in 1980.

3 Movin’ on Up (The Jeffersons)

Fish don’t fry in the kitchen, beans don’t burn on the grill

Took a whole lotta tryin’ just to get up that hill

Now we’re up in the big leagues gettin’ our turn at bat

As long as we live it’s you and me baby

There ain’t nothin’ wrong with that

Well we’re movin’ on up

One of the personal benefits of projects like this is that I get to relive my childhood, and in some cases clarify an otherwise fuzzy memory. The Jeffersons…a spinoff of All in the Family…aired from 1975-85, so it actually debuted when I was two years old. Two!! The back half of that run (and reruns of the first few years) must’ve really made an impression on me. The theme song was co-written & performed by actress Ja’Net DuBois, who had a supporting role in Good Times. A gospel choir backed DuBois, which is certainly one of the elements that makes the song so memorable.

2 Where Everybody Knows Your Name (Cheers)

Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name

And they’re always glad you came

You want to be where you can see our troubles are all the same

You want to be where everybody knows your name

Childhood is fascinating. As a friend of mine is fond of saying, we don’t know what we don’t know. Ignorance is bliss, right?? So when a sitcom set in a bar premiered in 1982…a week before my 10th birthday…all I knew was that it was funny. It made my Dad laugh. By the time the show ended I was 20 years old and simply thought of it as one of the best comedy shows I’d ever seen. It wasn’t until much later that I realized, in real life, middle aged adults spending every night in a bar is profoundly sad. It is a testament to the brilliance of the Cheers cast & writers that they turned that premise into one of the greatest television programs of all time. Gary Portnoy is a singer/songwriter who had penned a few songs for artists like Dolly Parton & Air Supply, and would eventually write the theme for Mr. Belvedere. As opposed to The Jeffersons quasi-inspirational, gospel infused title sequence, the Cheers theme is a piano driven, somewhat wistful tune that effectively does its job of making the bar seem like an amazing place to hang.

1 The Ballad of Gilligan’s Isle (Gilligan’s Island)

Just sit right back and you’ll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip

That started from this tropic port aboard this tiny ship

We’ve reached the summit. The most memorable television theme song of them all. The truth, of course, is that these things are subjective, influenced by a myriad of factors. Gilligan’s Island probably shouldn’t even register on my radar, given the fact that it only lasted for three seasons in the mid-1960s and was canceled five years before I was born. However, as we’ve discussed, syndicated reruns were abundant in the 1970s & 80s, allowing multiple shows that had played roles in the childhoods of kids much older than me to also be infused into my life. These days television programming embraces darker, edgier, more sinister content. Even comedy tends to evoke a sardonic, highly strung worldview. The sitcoms I grew up watching were goofy, irreverent, and guileless. Gilligan’s Island is quaint when viewed thru a modern prism, but in its time it worked, and we shouldn’t overlook the contribution of a theme song that is not only catchy, but also explains the premise AND introduces each of the cast members. It is no coincidence that the song was co-written by the show’s creator, Sherwood Schwartz. He also created The Brady Bunch and co-wrote that theme song, which followed the same formula of setting up the premise & characters.