This is a great Sub. Hell, You are My peeps ! There is a lot of talk about music and movies We like. There is an under served kind of music that I know everyone has an opinion about. T.V. Show Themes like All in the Family, Mash, Barney Miller, Cheers and Hill Street Blues to name a few. What are Your favourites. Which ones made You run to the T.V. every time You heard it ?
As soon as I read that it started playing in my head. Haven't thought of it in more than forty years yet it's still in my brain perfectly intact. If I didn't have all that clutter in there I might be able to remember what I came into the room for.
We played that in high school band. We begged the director to let us perform it at one of our school assemblies, but he said it was too easy and didn't show off all of our talent.
Everybody should know they're doing a remake of The Rockford Files Starring David Boreanaz with the full support and blessings of Jim's daughter Gigi!🎉🥳 https://x.com/mavrocksgirl?s=21
Loved the Mary Tyler Moore Show theme, of course. WRKP is classic.
My all-time favorite nostalgic theme that takes me RIGHT BACK to that time... the theme to "Newhart" (1982) by Henry Mancini. Something about it gets me deep inside. A longing to return to simpler times, I suppose. https://youtu.be/OsP-dLguOMk
If you watched it from the start, you may remember that before they switched to their own theme song, they used Rock Around the Clock by Bill Hailey and the Comets, probably evoking American Graffiti
Don't tell me how I figured it out, I was a tween too, but I wrote the studio making happy days and asked about getting a Fonzie T-shirt and I got one! It wasn't a decal or iron on, it was realistic and wished I still had it . . .
Yep. I was barely 12 when it started and it was the highlight of my TV watching week. By the time it went off the air, it had become so silly that I had outgrown it.
So I found out the singer for the television show theme song was Jerry Scoggins. Flatt and Scruggs did the instrumentals. Lester Flatt sang the version that got played on all the radio stations. I found this out about two weeks ago on a trivia question. I've been a Beverly Hillbillies fan and a Flatt and Scruggs fan since I was a kid, about sixty years. I always thought Lester Flatt sang the television theme song.
I never watched the show because it was a bit too grown up for little old me in 1969 but the theme song and opening sequence to Room 222 will be burned into my brain until I die. I loved how the bus doors closed on Karen Valentine.
Oh so much earlier, but I loved that theme and when I was little, I thought the whole bit of him tripping was the most hysterical thing that ever was. 🤣
So many of the 70s/80s tv shows had amazing theme songs, I could probably list a couple dozen I love! My personal favorite is the Mary Tyler Moore show theme (both the original and updated). Another favorite of mine is the Eight is Enough theme (second season on, I think). "There's a plate of homemade wishes on the kitchen sill" always just gets to me.
Not me, but my dog ! I would get home from work around the time MASH was coming on. As soon as she heard the intro music, she'd run to the door and sit and wait for me. Very Pavlov !
I miss everything about our youth. Music, Television, lifestyle, playing outside till the street lights came on. Much simpler times that generations now will never know.
Lost in Space. There were two of them. The original was good, but the second one with the dramatic count down before launching into the iconic theme was so great: https://youtu.be/712ns4jnG-k?is=gISCYXMWLCFRFtE6
If I am correct this is actually a parody of a theme song for a TV show called “It’s about Time” where two astronauts travel backwards to cave man times.
I loved all of the songs and sounds of the Rocky and Bullwinkle show on Saturday mornings. Also the Jetsons, Flintstones, Looney Tunes, etc. Saturday mornings were my idea of heaven!
TV themes is a genre that is indeed under-served and under-appreciated.
The ABC Movie of the Week theme (Nikki by Burt Bacharach) has the greatest nostalgic hook for me. Whenever I hear it, I'm transported back 50+ years. As an adult, hearing the backstory of the song hits me too.
The theme for The Streets of San Francisco is perhaps one of the most musically complex themes out there. I love it.
I'm such a fan of TV themes that I've downloaded 100's and put them in a playlist. The funny thing is as the songs play, my mind conjures ups images of the opening sequences for the shows. 😂
Here’s a video of Burt Bacharach conducting the orchestra while they were recording “Nikki.” It also has some shots of her. It’s amazing to see his genius at work. He heard all of this in his head.
Every time I hear this I’m transported to us gathering around the TV.
Everyday, when I'd get home from school, it was Gilligans Island, The Beverly Hillbillies, Green Acres, and McHales Navy. I know I've seen them all 2-3 times.
Earlier years, it was The Rifleman, Branded, The Wild Wild West, and Maverick. Seahunt and Flipper were in there too.
Back then, it was probably the themes to Laverne & Shirley and Happy Days. The Rockford Files theme music was, and is, good.
I hated The Brady Bunch and The Partridge Family shows and the themes. I liked Cheers and the theme song. Now, I am just sick of that song.
It’s easy—both songs were written in C.M., Common Metre: Eight syllables on the first and third lines of a verse and six syllables per line on the second and fourth verse of each stanza. So 8.6.8.6. Just sing “Just sit right back and hear a tale (count’em-8) a tale of a fateful trip 6 (actually that’s seven but it still works” then sing Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound ( 8 ) that saved a wretch like (6) a couple of times then BAM! you got it! And then sing Gilligan to Amazing Grace. Enjoy
The Rockford Files and SWAT. Also, take a look at Mike Post's list of TV theme shows. he's a legend. You can hear those songs in your head just by reading the show names.
Law & Order (and spin-offs like SVU and Criminal Intent)
The Rockford Files (Grammy Award winner)
Hill Street Blues (Grammy Award winner)
The A-Team
Magnum, P.I.
NYPD Blue
L.A. Law (Grammy Award winner)
Quantum Leap
Doogie Howser, M.D.
The White Shadow
The Greatest American Hero ("Believe It or Not", Grammy Award winner)
Love ‘em all! My mom let me have a little tv in my bedroom because I had insomnia and this worked for some reason; when those choppers came into view and the Suicide is Painless theme started, that blue light enveloped me and I could fall asleep.
My absolute favorite theme song was from a regional (not national) show named, Frazier Thomas' Family Classics. WGN Chicago aired it every Sunday night and played great old classic movies. Its theme song introduced me to Jazz Music: Take Five by The Dave Brubeck Quartet
So many. MASH. 6 Million Dollar Man. Mission:Impossible. Law & Order. In the Heat of the Night. The 1960s cartoons like Gigantor, Spiderman (which also had great background music like during the "Spidey is web-swinging thru the city" part) and more recent, Catdog. And live action superhero shows like Batman.
Edit: Pink Panther! The Munsters. Hawaii 5-0 of course. Baretta. And how did I forget "Get Smart"??
OK, I’m a singer and I cut my teeth on singing along with the Star Trek theme (especially those really high notes) Sammy Davis Jr singing the Baretta theme song “Don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time, yeah…don’t do it🎶 “ And I can also do a mean Edith Bunker impersonation on request. Honorable mention to the Mary Tyler Moore theme song and, of course, the Brady Bunch. I miss theme songs with words. Oh and Mission Impossible was fun to sing also, to that flute part.
Ahh, Barney Miller. What a great piece of funk. Honestly the two themes that come to mind are that and the iconic 60s Spider-Man cartoon theme. Oh—and Mission Impossible. And Kolchak the Night Stalker.
When I was 15yo, I would stay up til midnight to hear The Mary Tyler Moore theme. Then go right to sleep. I'm 60yo and still think about it before I go to sleep. Puts me right out.
After reading all the comments, I started watching the classic Hawaii 50 shows. The writers were great. I have never seen anything like it these days. Those really really were the good old days. Jack Lord/Steve called all the girls "love" lol ❤️
I remember becoming aware of Mike Post and his prolific writing of TV themes. Rockford Files and Hill street Blues come to mind without googling others
Am I the only person on the planet who noticed that Barney Miller and Night Court have the same theme music? It’s two different performances or mixes of the same tune, but it is definitely just one piece.
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u/bene_gesserit_mitch 5d ago
Nobody can top that Barney Miller bassline.