THE GALAXY SONG
I still get tickled that I chose Monty Python’s Galaxy Song to perform at my voice teacher’s online Christmas recital. I don’t know what drew me to it, as I hadn’t heard it in ages. But I listened to several arrangements and was particularly drawn to the version by Jim Post with an added “lighten up” ending. Please listen to it here:
Jim Post’s Galaxy Song/Lighten Up
I had several weeks to practice before the recital, which would showcase the talents of about a dozen little kids and one old lady.
With the number of numbers and the dimensions it portrayed, the song was, ahem, challenging, for an old lady who cares a lot about the vastness and beauty of the universe but very little about the quantification of space. I practiced a lot on purpose and even more not on purpose because The Galaxy Song, complete with the “Lighten up” ending, became an intrusive earworm that warbled to me upon my awakening, crooned to me all day, and lullabyed me to sleep at night.
When I was ready enough, Ed videoed my performance. It took, ahem, thirteen takes to get words and notes and intonations and breaths and facial expressions to a place I didn’t hate them. I still sort of hated my facial expressions, but, oh well.
And then it was fun seeing people grin and nod as they watched me perform. Several grandparents were there, watching their little sweeties play piano and sing excerpts from Frozen and Star Wars and Harry Potter, and my Monty Python number fit right in. When the recital was over, I felt satisfied.
But The Galaxy Song earworm didn’t go away. I sang it while cooking and folding clothes and walking up and down the stairs, and I noticed that, over time, singing it seemed to calm me. I’d imagine our universe’s immense expanse of space and time, and I’d feel an overwhelming sense of my own smallness and insignificance–but not in a diminishing way. I became even more aware that, though miniscule in the overall scheme of things, what I put out into the universe is, indeed significant, and does, in fact, make an impact. The song melded with my growing belief in the power of love to win out over hate in the end.
Holding both of those stances at the same time—my minuteness in the overall scheme of things and a belief that I absolutely matter in it, is a fine place for me to be. And, though I still spend more time than I’d like in horror and disbelief at our world’s dis-eases, I treasure the gift The Galaxy Song has been, and am grateful for the peace and resilience I’ve gained from embracing it.
My favorite part is the Jim Post add on to the original song. It reminds me not to grind my teeth, to let my shoulders drop, to turn down the volume of the voices whispering gloom and doom.
Lighten up. There are stars in the sky.
Lighten up. It’s a good question: Why?
But you don’t know the answer. And neither do I.
So, meanwhile, let’s just all lighten up.
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