Leonard Nimoy – The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins

We all need a laugh sometimes. This is one of the most bizarre songs + videos I’ve ever seen.

Do I have any readers that are Star Trek fans of the original series? The reason I ask is that within a couple of weeks, I’ll be going over every episode like I did with the Twilight Zone. I hope you will enjoy it. There are not many shows you can do that with on a blog but I think Star Trek will work as well as the Twilight Zone.

I just couldn’t resist posting this. One youtube commenter said: I attended a Trek convention with a friend in the 80s. He had a copy of Nimoy’s LP and wanted it autographed. He presented it to Nimoy during the signing event. Nimoy shook his head and said, “God, I thought we burned all of these”, then grudgingly signed it. He lightened up on that stance as the years went by and would sing parts of it at conventions.

It is amusing to see him smile in the video as that rarely happened in Star Trek. I have a question for my readers if you made it this far. At first in the video, it looks like he is wearing the Spock ears but in the middle… it doesn’t look like he is…is he? It’s not the clearest video but worth watching.

The song was written by Charles Randolph Grean. He was best known as the arranger for the Nat King Cole recording of The Christmas Song. In 1950, he wrote “The Thing,” a popular novelty song that reached number one on the charts in a version sung by Phil Harris.

Nimoy has quite the discography. He released 5 albums between 1967 and 1970 plus a compilation in 1993 named Highly Illogical. This song was on the 1968 album Two Sides of Leonard Nimoy.

The song got noticed more after the movie series than it had been during its initial release. It was also on a 1996 15-minute documentary titled Funk Me Up Scotty. The film had been made for BBC’s Star Trek Night.  The song gets circulated now pretty regularly.

When asked where the master tapes were in 2003…Leonard Nimoy: “I’m not looking for a wave of Leonard Nimoy Hobbit songs all over the world. I don’t think it’s gonna happen” 

Here is Funk Me Up Scotty

(Everyone sing along)

The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins

In the middle of the earth in the land of the Shire
Lives a brave little hobbit whom we all admire.
With his long wooden pipe,
Fuzzy, woolly toes,
He lives in a hobbit-hole and everybody knows him

Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
He’s only three feet tall
Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
The bravest little hobbit of them all

Now hobbits are a peace-lovin’ folks you know
They don’t like to hurry and they take things slow
They don’t like to travel away from home
They just want to eat and be left alone
But one day Bilbo was asked to go
On a big adventure to the caves below,
To help some dwarves get back their gold
That was stolen by a dragon in the days of old.

Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
He’s only three feet tall
Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
The bravest little hobbit of them all

Well he fought with the goblins!
He battled a troll!!
He riddled with Gollum!!!
A magic ring he stole!!!!
He was chased by wolves!!
Lost in the forest!!!
Escaped in a barrel from the elf-king’s halls!!!

Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
The bravest little hobbit of them all

Now he’s back in his hole in the land of the Shire,
That brave little hobbit whom we all admire,
Just a-sittin’ on a treasure of silver and gold
A-puffin’ on his pipe in his hobbit-hole.

Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
He’s only three feet tall
Bilbo! Bilbo! Bilbo Baggins
The bravest little hobbit of them all

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball fan, old movie and tv show fan... and a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

28 thoughts on “Leonard Nimoy – The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins”

  2. I found Funk Me Up Scotty difficult to watch, but The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins was adorable. I may not be the biggest Trekkie on the planet, but I imagine that I have seen every episode and I also watch a lot of the spin off shows, so I will be reading all of your upcoming posts, Max.

    Liked by 1 person

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  3. I’m a big fan of all three subjects and I’m very happy to see there’s a connection between LOTR and LM of Star Trek! Looking forward to it. Hope you’ll cover William Shatners recoding career as well.

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Cool! A little over a year ago I went through the complete TZ with about 3 episode posts a week….It took me a year to finish…Star Trek won’t take as long….less episodes.
      I’ll do some side posts on the musical adventures of the Nimoy and Shatner

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    1. Many of the things out of Star Trek are here now…Some say some of the things, like the microwave were already in the process of being made but some say that many of the inventors were Star Trek fans and they invented based on that.

      Liked by 1 person

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  6. Oh…dear…god… I am on cringe overload. How these two kept a straight face with their performances, IDK. I have an easier time listening to Star Trekkin’.

    And, as an answer to your question…yes, Nimoy’s ears are pointed in that video. The points are not as prominent as in the show. Considering that there are pointy-eared characters in The Hobbit & LOTR, this works.

    Good catch.

    Star Trek episodes…so very much up my alley!

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  7. well…that’s different! Could it be that the young ‘uns back then had a way of getting into a mind space that made them appreciate ones like this more than many of us today do? hmmm… Actually, it’s a weird but fun video and the tune not as bad as I had thought it might be. Thanks for sharing it!
    Now Shatner, he’s different too. His ‘Lucy in the Sky’ is, well, legendary but perhaps for same reason as say the movie ‘Ishtar’. But his ‘Has Been’ album of around 2004 isn’t terrible and in fact has a few good musical moments

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  8. I was never a Lord of the Rings fan, so I’m afraid a lot of the humor is lost on me. In the ’60’s and especially in the ’70’s there were many celebrities who tried to sing…

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  10. Max I think you’re right. At the 10 min mark in the first video he def doesn’t have his Spock ears on. Such funny examples of the various Star Trek actors singing. Data from the reboot sounded pretty good. Happy you’re going to do the series on your blog. I’ve got 4 watched as of now.

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Yea I have to like this one lol. It’s so bizarre! I always give Nimoy a little more credit than Shatner…why I don’t know….I guess it’s the Spock in me.

      Liked by 1 person

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  12. Bizarre group of videos here. Stranger than (science) fiction. I did see all the Star Treks when they first aired, but admittedly did not partake of any of the later franchise entries. That being said, I will always find time to watch The Trouble with Tribbles episode.

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