Little Drummer Boy. Few things bring back such turbulent memories of my childhood as this. When I was but a wee lad, my dear mother decided it would make good sport to dress me up like a little Injun and give me a little drum to play whilst she sang the song in front of the church. I think this was one of those things that parents do to their children that seems like an awesome idea to them, but they never think about running past their 4 year old.
This song is terrible less on its own accord than for what it represents to me. I grew up in a rather small church and my mom is an above average singer, so they’d always have her sing a song or two for the Christmas Program. She bought me a little toy drum and taught me to play it along with the “rum pa pa pum” part. I wasn’t terribly excited about this, but I went along with it… For a little while.
Finally the day of the Christmas program arrived. The choir went through the typical church Christmas classics. It was far too small to have any sort of live musicians, so it was all that piped in music the choir sang over. Then it came time for my Mom and me to perform. We walked to the front and I sat on the stairs leading to the pulpit as I had been instructed. The tape started up and my Mom began to sing. I sat there. It came time for me to play my drum and still I sat there. No drumming. No paradiddles. I just sat there.
After a verse or two, I just set down my drum and walked back to my seat. I was done.
An important lesson was taught to the world that day; Biloxi Von Lutz does not mind being the center of attention, but, dammit, he does it on his own terms.
As you watch this video of David Bowie and Bing Crosby singing in this video, reflect on what happened to me on this day 23 years ago.
umm, on a semi related topic, when did the little drummer boy become native american? wasnt he playing for jesus, presumably in Isreal, unless the song is originally morman and then all bets are off, “joseph smith is a big fat liar dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb”
It was the 80′s, Indians were really popular back then.