Continuing on the “Barbie” bandwagon…
I’m not really a pop music guy, but this is brilliant: a series of piano variations on “Barbie Girl,” a song from 1997 by the Danish-Norwegian pop-dance group Aqua. It’s not only clever – the song presented in the styles of Mozart, Beethoven, Schumann, Schubert, Chopin, and Ravel – it’s a virtuosic demonstration of the concept of theme and variations, with plenty of musical in-jokes and on-screen commentary along the way.
Also topical is the revelation about A.I. at the end.
The song itself was inspired by an exhibit on kitsch culture in Denmark. Mattel was not amused. The lyrics, about Barbie and Ken, prompted legal action from the dolls’ creators. The songwriters argued that it was intended as social commentary.
Interestingly, the opening of Aqua’s video alludes to “Also sprach Zarathustra,” which I understand also opens the “Barbie” movie. The song, “Barbie Girl,” is also referenced in the film.
And while we all chuckle at the preposterous juxtaposition of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” – Christopher Nolan’s biopic about the father of the atomic bomb – here’s an interesting thought piece than ran in the Washington Post on July 19: “‘Barbie’ and ‘Oppenheimer’ tell the same terrifying story.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/07/19/barbie-oppenheimer-movies-anthropocene/
An even more imminent terror is that I’m going to be caught humming “I’m a Barbie Girl” at the grocery store.