For some reason, our music teacher decided that we should get into groups of three. Each group would practice a song together and then present to the class as a group. The best part was that we were allowed to pick any song we wanted. In 5th grade I was a bit of a prankster. This was a golden opportunity to get a laugh from my classmates and sweet exasperation from our music teacher.
I easily talked the other two kids in my group into my plan to disrupt the class. We were going to sing “Song of the Pious Itinerant”, also known as “Hallelujah, I’m a Bum”.
The song had been recorded by several performers over the years, but I learned the song from The New Christy Minstrels. Apparently my uncle had originally purchased a copy of their album, Tall Tales! Legends & Nonsense. I found it among other records that had been collected before I was born, but ended up at grandma’s house.
Finally it was our turn to sing our song in front of the class. I even had typed lyric sheets.
First, the intro.
Hallelujah. Hallelujah. Hallelujah.
Of course this was taken directly from Handel’s Messiah. In the Catholic Church this is considered sacred music. We got through the intro with only a stern glance from the teacher.
Then the song goes right into a chorus
Hallelujah, I’m a bum
Hallelujah, bum again
Hallelujah, give me handout
And you’ll be my friend
My little singing group got through nearly a minute of the song when the teacher demanded that we stop. She told us to step out to the hall and wait for her. Shortly thereafter I was in the principal’s office.
It turns out that we were committing blasphemy. WHOOPS! The reason they gave was that the music to Handel’s Messiah was too sacred to mock by using it as an intro for such a vulgar song. They sent me home with a note to my parents. My mother saw the note and asked me what happened at school. I told her. She laughed. I hope you did too.
Have you ever gotten in trouble at school for singing a song? What song? Did you sing it for class like I did, or maybe got caught in the hallway in between class? Let me know in the comments!
-Wacky Alex
FunHouse Radio 
A true and rather terrifying story on a similar theme. My high school was in the province of Quebec, Canada, and at that time (early 1970s, going on the 17th Century) the catholic church ran most of the public education system in the province–the “protestant” schools run by the state and elite private schools made up the rest. In the suburban Montreal town where I lived my school was the higher-education type high school for university-bound pupils. No shop classes, lots of English and French literature, languages, some Latin, maths, history, performing and fine arts, etc.
It was pretty normal for the most part, but with one big caveat: going against the church was a recipe to find yourself being strapped and then suspended–and then getting another beating by your parents when they found out. This was a very different time, and a different life. Most boys and half the girls got the strap at some point between the first and 11th grades, me included. Part of growing up.
It was the end of the school year in June and the annual student-run variety show for staff and parents was the highlight at the time, on the final Sunday evening of the term. The graduating class had to do *something*, either serious or funny; a reading, a skit, a stand-up routine, a song, a dance, a scene from a play or movie, etc. Part of the arts program IIRC. I parroted a (clean) George Carlin bit—”funny news” and got a ton of laughs.
But it was a group of I think 5 or so kids who chose to invite the wrath of the bishop and clergy in attendance by doing, of all things, Tom Lehrer’s “The Vatican Rag.” It was the final skit, I think, and it brought the house down. But the bishop and clergy in attendance weren’t laughing.
It was the last week of school, so what would could anybody do?
Well, we all found out the next morning at general assembly. All the lads involved were brought on stage, and caned mercilessly by the bishop personally and forced to beg god for forgiveness after each lash. Two were hospitalized and bleeding. All were expelled and their graduations rescinded. Last I heard they were sent to the (catholic-run) vocational high school 10 miles away. The school that taught you how to fix cars, plumbing, carpentry, operate machinery and the like. You get sent there and you’ll never be accepted into any university in the country. Again, different time, different way of life.
It was horrifying to watch, but watch we had to, with the admonition of being “next” if we said a word during or after. It made the papers but from what I gather nothing much happened except the clergy that was involved was reassigned out of the school system. I got the hell out of Quebec a year later and never looked back. I also never entered a church again and became the blaspheming atheist I am today. But I came to positively love the music of Tom Lehrer and other parodists and satirists. “Let us prey…” should have been the motto of that diocese.
As for the song in question, I’m pretty sure that was originally recorded (and likely written) by real-life hobo Harry “Haywire Mac” McClintock; he of the Big Rock Candy Mountain and Ain’t We Crazy fame.
When I was in High School-a girl’s boarding school run by Catholic nuns- a few of us gathered to watch Ed Sullivan on the weekend. We were very excited on a particular evening because The Rolling Stones we’re making their debut on the show. They sang “Satisfaction” as we sang along. We loved all the British groups at the time and never really thought much about the lyrics- just sang along. When the nun in charge realized what we were singing, I saw her face go white, then red and order us back to the dorm! I never saw anyone turn since!
No, never got in trouble for a song. But on a field trip as a freshman in a Roman Catholic school, I once bought a space game (board game) from a hobby store and then also stole a Playboy magazine from a newsstand. For the bus ride back to the school (Salesians) I took the insert in the game out of the box and hid the magazine under the insert, then put all the pieces of the game back into place.
Halfway home one of my teachers, a Roman Catholic brother (studying to be a priest) asked if he could see the game. He looked inside and then looking puzzled lifted the insert out to reveal the magazine under it in the box.
I thought I was going to die.
He put the insert back in, boxed it all up, and frowned and scowled at me as he handed it back to me saying, “There seems to be a lot to discover in empty spaces, huh?”
I was too shocked and embarrassed to say anything and just took the game back. Never got in trouble for it. Perhaps he understood a boy in adolescence needs to explore certain spaces in his own life!