#MusicMonday – June 11, 2018

Did you ever find yourself with that one song you love, but you hear it and all of a sudden, it is just stuck with you?  Or, have you ever found yourself dancing to it and trying to be covert about it?

Oh, you haven’t?

I’m not one to hide my love for dance, nor am I one to shy away from a musical moment.  Admittedly, if I hear a song I like in public, and it is worthy of some improvisation, I’m not above admitting that I’m going to dance it out.  Amusement park lines, the grocery store, that one hallway in college that I never saw anyone using – every place is fair game.

The world is (rightly so) a stage, folks.  That’s just fact.

One artist, whose music I felt was a danceable as Paula Abdul and Janet Jackson’s back in the day was Gloria Estefan.  My mom had her Greatest Hits cassette, and I loved listening the hell out of that cassette, especially today’s song.

They tell me you’re a shy boy, but I want you just the same.  Don’t play innocent with me, you know it’s not just fun and games…

So Gloria Estefan proclaimed in her 1988 song “1-2-3.”

“1-2-3” was written by Miami Sound Machine (Gloria Estefan’s band) drummer and lead songwriter Enrique “Kiki” Garcia, along with Estefan, and released in the summer of 1988 as the fifth and final single from their album Let it Loose.  The song’s story is about the singer’s desire for a shy suitor to approach her, though based on the music video, Estafan would never have had that problem.

Hey, he wants her, the passion burns inside, after all.  She just needs to coax it out of him.

See for yourself, why don’t you?

“1-2-3” reached #1 on the Billboard Adult Contemporary charts, and #3 on the Hot 100 (#62 at year end for 1988).  I love the rhythm and Latin feel that this, and other Estefan songs, have.  This isn’t exactly a song one would want their six-year-old to sing, but I LOVED the lyrics to this song, even if I had no clue what it was about.  I think it was all about the counting, to be honest.

In 1990, “1-2-3” had a cameo appearance as a song in the Bar Mitzvah scene in the romantic comedy Opportunity Knocks, memorable for Dana Carvey’s artful seducing via dance.

I made the mistake of showing my fiancee this, long before we were engaged.  Now I’m convinced I’ll leave the room and he’ll request this at our wedding…and do this exact dance.

Oy vey.

Anyway, he set out to do what the song was about…and he won over the girl.

It’s not the greatest movie, but it’s pretty funny.  I recommend it if you haven’t already seen it.

On that funny note, I’m going to wrap it up here.  I’m just gonna keep on counting, till you are mine…or this article ends.

Here.

Have a great Monday, and enjoy the music!