Hello! Ma Baby
Encyclopedia
Tin Pan Alley
Tin Pan Alley is the name given to the collection of New York City music publishers and songwriters who dominated the popular music of the United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century...
song written in 1899 by the team of Joseph E. Howard
Joseph E. Howard
Joseph E. Howard was a Broadway composer, lyricist, and librettist. His Broadway credits include The District Leader, The Land of Nod and The Song Birds, The Time, the Place and the Girl, The Flower of the Ranch, The Girl Question, Stubborn Cinderella, The Goddess of Liberty, Maurice Chevalier in...
and Ida Emerson ("Howard and Emerson"). Its subject is a man who has a girlfriend he knows only through the telephone
Telephone
The telephone , colloquially referred to as a phone, is a telecommunications device that transmits and receives sounds, usually the human voice. Telephones are a point-to-point communication system whose most basic function is to allow two people separated by large distances to talk to each other...
. The song was first recorded by Arthur Collins on Edison 5470.
Although it is portrayed as a "coon song
Coon song
Coon songs were a genre of music popular in the United States and around the English-speaking world from 1880 to 1920, that presented a racist and stereotyped image of blacks.-Rise and fall from popularity:...
", with African-American caricatures on the sheet music, the song is easily adaptable to any singer.
Its chorus is far better known than its verse, as the introductory song in the famous Warner Bros.
Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...
cartoon One Froggy Evening
One Froggy Evening
One Froggy Evening is an approximately seven-minute long Technicolor animated short film written by Michael Maltese and directed by Chuck Jones, with musical direction by Milt Franklyn.The short makes the debut of Michigan J...
(1955), sung by the character later dubbed Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog is an animated cartoon character who debuted in the Looney Tunes cartoon One Froggy Evening , written by Michael Maltese and directed by Chuck Jones...
and high-stepping in the style of Bert Williams
Bert Williams
Egbert Austin "Bert" Williams was one of the preeminent entertainers of the Vaudeville era and one of the most popular comedians for all audiences of his time. He was by far the best-selling black recording artist before 1920...
:
- Hello! ma baby
- Hello! ma honey
- Hello! ma ragtime gal
- Send me a kiss by wire
- Baby, ma heart's on fire!
- If you refuse me
- Honey, you'll lose me
- Then you'll be left alone
- Oh, baby, telephone
- And tell me I'm your own!
In popular culture
In Charles IvesCharles Ives
Charles Edward Ives was an American modernist composer. He is one of the first American composers of international renown, though Ives' music was largely ignored during his life, and many of his works went unperformed for many years. Over time, Ives came to be regarded as an "American Original"...
's composition Central Park in the Dark
Central Park in the Dark
Central Park in the Dark is a music composition by Charles Ives for chamber orchestra. It was composed in 1906 and has been paired with The Unanswered Question as part of “Two Contemplations” and Hallowe’en and The Pond in “Three Outdoor Scenes.”...
"In The Good Old Summer Time", it is quoted frequently.
Paul Kinsey, a character on AMC's Mad Men
Mad Men
Mad Men is an American dramatic television series created and produced by Matthew Weiner. The series premiered on Sunday evenings on the American cable network AMC and are produced by Lionsgate Television. It premiered on July 19, 2007, and completed its fourth season on October 17, 2010. Each...
, sang this song in the season 3 episode "My Old Kentucky Home".
The song is sung by two characters in the 2007 episode "Bless Me Father, For I Have Sinned" of Saving Grace
Saving Grace (TV series)
Saving Grace is an American television crime drama series which premiered on TNT on July 23, 2007 and ran until June 21, 2010. The show stars Academy Award-winner Holly Hunter in her first television series, as well as Leon Rippy, Kenny Johnson, Laura San Giacomo, Bailey Chase, Bokeem Woodbine,...
.
It was also sung by Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog is an animated cartoon character who debuted in the Looney Tunes cartoon One Froggy Evening , written by Michael Maltese and directed by Chuck Jones...
in Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes
Looney Tunes is a Warner Bros. animated cartoon series. It preceded the Merrie Melodies series and was Warner Bros.'s first animated theatrical series. Since its first official release, 1930's Sinkin' in the Bathtub, the series has become a worldwide media franchise, spawning several television...
several times, including in Looney Tunes: Back in Action
Looney Tunes: Back in Action
Looney Tunes: Back in Action is a 2003 American live action/animated adventure comedy film directed by Joe Dante and starring Brendan Fraser, Jenna Elfman, Timothy Dalton, and Steve Martin. The film is essentially a feature-length Looney Tunes cartoon, with all the wackiness and surrealism typical...
, when Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is a animated character created in 1938 at Leon Schlesinger Productions, later Warner Bros. Cartoons. Bugs is an anthropomorphic gray rabbit and is famous for his flippant, insouciant personality and his portrayal as a trickster. He has primarily appeared in animated cartoons, most...
tells Kate Houghton that he plays the female co-star and dresses as a female. Michigan J. Frog, sitting at a table behind Kate and Bugs, starts singing the song.
It was sung in the movie Spaceballs
Spaceballs
Spaceballs is a 1987 American science fiction comedy parody film co-written by, directed by, Mel Brooks and starring Bill Pullman, John Candy, Mel Brooks & Rick Moranis. It also features, Daphne Zuniga, Dick Van Patten, and the voice of Joan Rivers. The film was released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer on...
by an alien
Alien (film)
Alien is a 1979 science fiction horror film directed by Ridley Scott and starring Tom Skerritt, Sigourney Weaver, Veronica Cartwright, Harry Dean Stanton, John Hurt, Ian Holm and Yaphet Kotto. The film's title refers to its primary antagonist: a highly aggressive extraterrestrial creature which...
that emerges from a man's chest in the diner. This is the Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog
Michigan J. Frog is an animated cartoon character who debuted in the Looney Tunes cartoon One Froggy Evening , written by Michael Maltese and directed by Chuck Jones...
version as well.
In the South Park
South Park
South Park is an American animated television series created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone for the Comedy Central television network. Intended for mature audiences, the show has become famous for its crude language, surreal, satirical, and dark humor that lampoons a wide range of topics...
episode "Cancelled
Cancelled (South Park)
"Cancelled" is the season 7 premiere episode and the overall 97th episode, although intended to be the 100th, of the Comedy Central series South Park. It originally aired on March 19, 2003.- Plot :...
" (2003), the likeness of Saddam Hussein (briefly assumed by an alien) sings the song while dancing.
In an episode of American Dad, Steve sings it while dancing a dead frog.
In an episode of The Cleveland Show
The Cleveland Show
The Cleveland Show is an American animated television series that premiered on September 27, 2009, as a part of the "Animation Domination" lineup on Fox in the United States...
Rallo Tubbs posing as the class turtle through a baby monitor convinces Cleveland, Jr. to sing the song forwards then backwards.
In an episode of the comedy series F Troop
F Troop
F Troop is a satirical American television sitcom that originally aired for two seasons on ABC-TV. It debuted in the United States on September 14, 1965 and concluded its run on April 6, 1967 with a total of 65 episodes. The first season of 34 episodes was filmed in black-and-white, but the show...
"She's Only a Build in a Girdled Cage," Patrice Wymore sings a variation of the song that substitues "Hello my soldier boy" for "Hello ma ragtime gal."