Trondheim Hammer Dance
Nils Petter Liadal
Trondheim hammer dance" (about the women in Trondheim and how they use
to knock their husband in the head with a stick (??)). Searching the Web
I've found only ONE site that links this song to a Monty Python Record:
"Another Monty Python Record". While searching for more information
about this record (the one with the Beethoven cover(?)) I have never
seen this song mentioned again.
SO: Does anyone know anything about this song ? Anyone got the lyrics
for it ? DOES this record contain this song at all ?
The reason I ask is of course that I live in Trondheim (......and I'm
married....and I've never got by head knocked with a stick...yet.:-).
And; this is really ment for an other thread in this newsgroup, but
I'll just throw it in here: British comedy DOES rule!! (Monty Python,
Rowan Atkinson, "Yes, Prime Minister", Fawlty Towers etc. etc.)
Nils Petter Liadal
Trondheim
Norway
List
Nils Petter Liadal <nils.pett...@emmaedb.no> wrote in message
news:37788BD6...@emmaedb.no...
> Someone told me that Monty Pyhton has recorded a song by the name "The
> Trondheim hammer dance" (about the women in Trondheim and how they use
> to knock their husband in the head with a stick (??)). Searching the Web
> I've found only ONE site that links this song to a Monty Python Record:
> "Another Monty Python Record". While searching for more information
> about this record (the one with the Beethoven cover(?)) I have never
> seen this song mentioned again.
>
> SO: Does anyone know anything about this song ? Anyone got the lyrics
> for it ? DOES this record contain this song at all ?
>
> The reason I ask is of course that I live in Trondheim (......and I'm
> married....and I've never got by head knocked with a stick...yet.:-).
>
necks.
Nils Petter Liadal
> > for it ? DOES this record contain this song at all ?
> >
> > The reason I ask is of course that I live in Trondheim (......and I'm
> > married....and I've never got by head knocked with a stick...yet.:-).
> >
> Und der ladies are thrown into de fjords wis der boots tied around their
> necks.
Yes, we do that a lot over here......., or as we would say: "og damene blir
kastet i fjorden med støvlene hengt rundt halsen".
Sometimes we even tie hammers around their necks and dance while we sing "Ecki
ecki"....and then we throw them into the fjord. (Hammers are cheaper than
boots.)
Nils P.
Justin Alistair Lowde
er.l...@emmaedb.no> writes
>Someone told me that Monty Pyhton has recorded a song by the name "The
>Trondheim hammer dance" (about the women in Trondheim and how they use
>to knock their husband in the head with a stick (??)).
The sketch is on a record (? 'Another Monty Python Record') as follows
(from memory).
The record opens with:
"Our apologies to all those who bought this record thinking it was by
that humorous comedy programme Monty Python's Flying Circus. That was
due to an error in the printing stage of the album's cover. This record
is in fact Pleasures of the Dance, a collection of Norwegian Carpenters'
Songs, compiled by Oscar Tritt.
(Silly singing and morris-dancing sound)
'Fulda-rulda runga runga nit nit nit,
Fulda-rulda runga runga nit nit nit'
Voice-over by Oscar Tritt: "Zis is ze Trondheim Hammer Dance, vitch
takes place every 25 minutes in ze town of Trondheim, in vitch ze old
ladies are struck about ze head, viz round sticks or knurdl..."
(...and Mr. Tritt is suddenly cut off to make way for the next
apology.).
My flat-mate at university liked the sketch so much I made him a pair of
knurdl for his birthday.
Do you enjoy these dances? You must let me know what knurdl really look
like...!
--
Ali
Remove clothing. to reply bu email
List
credit card collection?
Nils Petter Liadal
> blir
> > kastet i fjorden med støvlene hengt rundt halsen".
> > Sometimes we even tie hammers around their necks and dance while we sing
> "Ecki
> > ecki"....and then we throw them into the fjord. (Hammers are cheaper than
> > boots.)
> >
> Well well - I learn something new about Scandinavia everyday - do you have a
> credit card collection?
Mmmmm......nope, but I do have my collection of secondhand toilet-paper, which
are very popular objects of collection here. I have one piece of paper from
1896, used by the famous Norwegian dancer Truls Bæsjen. His speciality was to
stand on his knees on a wooden floor, then suddenly standing up and throwing him
self around in the air while shouting "NI!!" everytime he was facing North.
(They actually used him as a compass aboard ships. Every time they heard him
shout NI!! they knew they were sailing north. The problem was that he would
never stop shouting, as long as they were sailing in that direction, so they
had to knock him in the head with som sort of knurled stick, which could be very
difficult as he were dancing around all the time, making him a hard target).
But; back to the Bæsjen and his special dance; one evening in 1896 he had been
eating a lot of fish, to much of it actually. When he suddenly rose from the
floor to start his famous NI-dance ("ni" in norwegian means "nine", and this
dance always started at nine o'clock) some of the fish made it's way out of
Bæsjen, and he felt a sudden need for a piece of paper. My great great
grandfather was there that night, and gave Bæsjen that piece of paper. Luckily
he remembered to ask for an autograph from Bæsjen afterwards. Unfortunalety they
had only that one piece of paper, which makes my secondhand piece of toiletpaper
very valuable.
And; we don't use credit cards here. All payment is done with fish, preferably
herring, but anything will do (salmon e.g., but that is for rich ppl only)
Nils Petter.
Nils Petter Liadal
> takes place every 25 minutes in ze town of Trondheim, in vitch ze old
> ladies are struck about ze head, viz round sticks or knurdl..."
>
> (...and Mr. Tritt is suddenly cut off to make way for the next
> apology.).
>
> My flat-mate at university liked the sketch so much I made him a pair of
> knurdl for his birthday.
>
> Do you enjoy these dances? You must let me know what knurdl really look
> like...!
Hi
Thank you very much for your information (same to you, Kai).
About the knurdl; can't really help you there. Never have heard about it,
never seen one I'm afraid :-) (But you should know, since you actually made
a pair of them for your flat-mate ;-)) But from the "Trondheim Hammer
Dance"-script I would say that they ment this "knurdle" to be a round stick
with knurls. We acually HAVE traditional folk dances involving sticks, but
then the stick is not used for striking. It's used this way:
The girl stands on a chair or something similar, holding a long stick
(approx. 6 feet) horizontal, in the same height as her own shoulders. On the
tip of the stick they put the boys hat. The boy is supposed to dance around
and then suddenly make a karate-like jump to kick down this hat. Of course
it MAY happen that the girl looses the stick and drops it in the head of the
male :-).
On May 17 (Norway's national day) we usually have many drunken
HighSchool-graduates strawling around in the streets. (they are called
"Russ" and they wear silly dresses and hats). For many years it was very
popular among these ppl to wear a special kind of stick made of bambus
(=full of knurls) which they basically used to knock around a lot with (the
primary target was usualy the ground or other dead objects, but I guess a
head or two must have been hit too). Maybe this also has been an inspiration
for the "Trondheim Hammer Dance".
It would be a terrific idea to arrange some sort of dance as described in
the "Trondheim Hammer Dance" in the streets of Trondheim. We DO want more
tourists to visit us :-/
If you want to see some pictures from Trondheim look at
http://www.multinet.no/~paalk/pics1.html
Nils Petter
Justin Alistair Lowde
er.l...@emmaedb.no> writes
>
>It would be a terrific idea to arrange some sort of dance as described in
>the "Trondheim Hammer Dance" in the streets of Trondheim. We DO want more
>tourists to visit us :-/
Remember that the dance takes place every 25 minutes, with no mention of
a pause for tea or sleep.
Perhaps you could organise a variation, such as a conga-style dance
snaking through the town, running into old ladies' houses every 25
minutes to strike them. The person leading could wear a distinctive
costume, such as a fez, a skull necklace, a bow tie, a grass skirt and
clogs. Or perhaps an ostrich costume?
You could do this in place of your traditional fish-slapping dance,
which I understand is very popular in Norway.
--
Ali
Justin Alistair Lowde
I've just noticed this:
>On May 17 (Norway's national day) we usually have many drunken
>HighSchool-graduates strawling around in the streets.
Strawling? Explain...! Is it yet another eccentric Scandinavian
practice? How does one do it?
--
Ali
Nils Petter Liadal
>
> >On May 17 (Norway's national day) we usually have many drunken
> >HighSchool-graduates strawling around in the streets.
>
> Strawling? Explain...! Is it yet another eccentric Scandinavian
> practice? How does one do it?
(*Sigh*) You mean that you're not at all familiar with the term "strawling"
??? Come on, even my dog know that this is an anglo-scandinavian 13-century
term that means to "straggle in the streets wearing a straw-coloured round
stick", not to be confused with the term "strawhling" which means exactly
the same, only with a straw-hat instead of the stick.
This term is even mentioned in the sketch "Brain, brain where are you my
brain" on the MP-record "Beat me up before you gogo", another dance-record
focusing on the chacha and gogo.
OK OK OK, I guess what I meant was "straggling", not "strawling".........My
english suffers badly from the fact that we were never a British colony
(they didn't want our fish, I guess). Instead the Danes ruled us for some
400 years. They strawled around in our streets and.....well well, now to
something completely different.
"What does fish without eyes sound like ? Fsh!"
Many Eckis and a few Ta-Pangs from
NI!!!ls Petter