"Holiday for Strings", written by David Rose, is an instrumental composition best known for its use as the theme song for ''

The Red Skelton Show ''The Red Skelton Show'' is an American television comedy/variety show that aired from 1951 to 1971. In the decade prior to hosting the show, Richard "Red" Skelton had a successful career as a radio and motion pictures star. Although his televi ...

'' for over 20 years and as the theme for the Brazilian Game Show Pra Ganhar é Só Rodar o Pião da Casa Própria (To win your own house just spin the wheel) aired by

SBT sbt is an open-source build tool for Scala (programming language), Scala and Java (programming language), Java projects, similar to Apache Software Foundation, Apache's Apache Maven, Maven and Gradle. Its main features are: *Native support fo ...

. Written in 1942, this piece is still recognized today as a classic American composition. The

pizzicato Pizzicato (, ; translated as "pinched", and sometimes roughly as "plucked") is a playing technique that involves plucking the strings of a string instrument. The exact technique varies somewhat depending on the type of instrument : * On bowe ...

strings and soaring melodies give this composition its distinctive sound.

Spike Jones Lindley Armstrong "Spike" Jones (December 14, 1911 – May 1, 1965) was an American musician and bandleader specializing in spoof arrangements of popular songs and classical music. Ballads receiving the Jones treatment were punctuated with gun ...

did a version using humorous instruments including a male impersonating a clucking chicken.

Allan Sherman Allan may refer to: People * Allan (name), a given name and surname, including list of people and characters with this name * Allan (footballer, born 1984) (Allan Barreto da Silva), Brazilian football striker * Allan (footballer, born 1989) (Al ...

did a version entitled "Holiday for States" mentioning all the 50 states in the union. (SOURCE: From the Alan Sherman album " Allan in Wonderland" (1964))

George Wright George Wright may refer to: Politics, law and government * George Wright (MP) (died 1557), MP for Bedford and Wallingford * George Wright (governor) (1779–1842), Canadian politician, lieutenant governor of Prince Edward Island * George Wright ...

covered the song in his 1984 album ''Red Hot and Blue''. The piece starts with an introduction with lush instrumentation in C Major, moving to F minor and back to C Major with the following theme: After a short transition setting the pace for the next section, it presents the main theme in pizzicato strings in F Major: After another transition reinforcing the key of C Major, the theme from the introduction reappears in A-Flat Major: The piece loses steam, and the same theme is transformed with a sentimental swing rhythm and transposed to B-Flat Major. After a chromatic fanfare modulating back to C Major, the main theme recapitulates in its home key and ends after a short Coda section.

References

1942 songs Instrumentals Comedy television theme songs Compositions for string orchestra Compositions by David Rose {{1940s-song-stub