Chicken Dance (or Birdie Song)

chickendance

Time Signature: 2.2

Key of Tune: C

Tune Type: Reel

Number of Bars: 64

Description:

The person responsible for this is Werner Thomas (born in 1929) – an accordionist from Switzerland – credited with composing it while working as a restaurant musician in Davos during the early 1960s. However Wiki  states “The name of the original Swiss song was “Der Ententanz” (The Duck Dance). It is rumored to be a drinking song sung at Oktoberfest. Sometime in the late 1970s, the song acquired the name “Vogeltanz” (The Bird Dance) or “Vogerltanz” (Little Bird Dance or Birdie Dance), although these names never caught on seriously in Germany. On some sheet music and recordings it is called “Dance Little Bird”. It appears that no one in Germany uses the term “Kükentanz” or “Huhn/Hühnertanz” (Küken means chick, Huhn/Hühner means chicken (sg./pl.)). Since 1963, Werner Thomas had played it in restaurants and hotels. During one of Thomas’ performances, Belgian producer Louis van Rijmenant heard the song. Van Rijmenant had some lyrics created and in 1970 released it to the public through his publishing company Intervox Music (later on co-publishing with his other company Eurovox Music) without much success. However, on subsequent releases of the song, Van Rijmenant was listed as co-author under the pen name of Terry Rendall. In 1982, polka-loving cover band “The Emeralds”, from Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, recorded a polka-inspired version of the song, released by K-Tel records. The album “Bird Dance” went double-platinum in Canada, and gold in Australia”

Engraved by:

Transcribed/Arranged by:

Composer: Werner Thomas

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