The parody of word-pairs: ALLITERATIVE BINOMIALS, part #1

POST #80
PARODY-LYRICS

ORIGINAL SONG: "The Elements", Tom Lehrer, 1959.

PARODY COMPOSED: Giorgio Coniglio, July, 2015.
WORDPLAY LINK: For a discussion of binomials (irreversible word pairs), and a compendium of alliterative pairs go to this post on our companion blog, "Edifying Nonsense".

KEYWORDS: goldenoldy, language

Occasional binomials show alliteration
(e.g. one and only)

I have previously posted 2 parodies of Tom Lehrer’s patter song “The Elements”. The current effort involves a linguistic device discussed by Wikipedia as “Siamese twins” or ‘Irreversible Binomials”. These phrases include some of the most colorful expressions in English. Please see the SUPPLEMENT after the song lyrics for baseline information.  There are probably a thousand binomial expressions in the English language. To enhance the singability, I have skewed my selection of binomial pairs to emphasize those that have alliteration of the 2 elements. I have also reserved binomial expressions which are used in "legalese" - these will be the subject of a later posting.  

Tom Lehrer

To view the previous postings on this site, search the site for "Tom Lehrer" 

You can also view the earlier songs' lyrics and commentary (without images or chords)  displayed on a parody-lyrics website at AmIRight.com Post "No Elements", (a song about Latin nouns), or at  AmIRight.com Post "Of Residents and Presidents" , (a song dealing with mispronunciation of the word 'nuclear'). 

WARNING!  Do not attempt to sing this at the pace of a patter-song. The management of this blog will take no responsibility for any injuries sustained.

ALLITERATIVE BINOMIALS
(word-pairs),  part#1

(to the tune of "The Elements" - Tom Lehrer)


For house and home, and king and country, love or leave it, bull or bear

And wild and woolly, weeping wailing, whys and wherefores, wash and wear

There’s lend and lease, lewd and lascivious, longitude and latitude

And odds and evens, wax and wane, and hoot and holler, crass and crude.

There’s form and function, farm and factory, and fling and flirta-ation

And feast or famine, rhyme and reason, rest and relaxa-ation 

There’s rough and ready, rags to riches, rock and roll, down and dirty

And dine and dash, and cheque or cash, and foppery and frippery.

There's live and learn, last but not least, and lemon lime, and life and limb

Safe and secure, and search and seizure, signs and symptoms, sink or swim

And sweet and sour, and Stars and Stripes, and sticks and stones, and sights and sounds

And hale and hearty, hot and heavy, birds and bees, and horse and hounds. 

There’s flora fauna, fun and frolic, fin and fur, forgive forget

Over and out, and tots and toddlers, tit for tat, restore reset 

And Jew and Gentile, dribs and drabs, naughty or nice, and juke and jive

And one and only, publish perish, bed and breakfast, drink and drive.

There’s poke and prod, and pen and paper, post and pillar, pig in poke

And rant and rave, and bread and butter, mix and match, and jeer and joke

Hell or high water, rod and reel, gruff grim, footloose and fancy-free,

Deny his due to devil, dos and don'ts, and also deep blue sea.

Nieces and nephews, peas in pod, kit and caboodle, meek and mild

And ghosts and goblins, trick or treat, witches and warlocks, wet and wild

And trials and tribulation, tried and true , thick thin, and tic-tac-toe

And cute and cuddly, fair or foul, and spick and span, and friend or foe.

Note: A second collection of amusing and instructive phrases has been posted on August 17, 2015, as "More Alliterative Binomials"; as per the following list........

HOT LINKS to the WORD-PAIR PARODY SONGS

Pairs
Alliterative Binomials, part #1 (see below)
Alliterative Binomials, part #2
Reduplications - Lesson
Reduplications - Lexicon A to K
Reduplications - Lexicon M to Z
Rhyming Binomials, A to M
Rhyming Binomials, M to Z
Legal Doublets

UKULELE-FRIENDLY FORMAT:
(Click on any chord-chart slide to move to 'song-presentation mode'; then navigate through thumbnails at bottom of page.)

You can play/sing Tom Lehrer's original patter-song, The Elements,  by checking  out Corktunes, the songbook of the Corktown Ukulele Jam here.  The chord-charts have the alternate-line superscript format that many ukers find preferable.
Lehrer had adapted the melody from "The Major General's Song" from Gilbert and Sullivan's "Pirates of Penzance". There are 3 somewhat different melodies/chord-sequences used in alteration through the GandS song, and in Lehrer's derived take-off.

My suggestion for the first 3 verses of the patter-list portion of this parody are shown here, but adapt them as you like! Incidentally, the Eb7 chord may look formidable to some - just use the barred version of D7 one fret higher, than slide back for the D7 that follows!
Pick or strum the way you like, but I have enjoyed the 3,(12),4,(12) picking pattern, continuing  through from line to line, except for an index finger 4-string flourish at the end of all the lines of the minor-tone verses, and in lines 3 and 4 of the other verses.

Be sure to continue with  Alliterative Binomials part #2.