N: The Name Game

 

The Name Game

Some people may be familiar with this song, but may not know its title. It's a rhyming song game that creates variations on people's names. Shirley Ellis, who co-wrote and sang the song, based the song on a game she'd played as a child. The rules for the song are as follows:

Using the name Katie as an example, the song follows this pattern:

Katie, Katie, bo-batie,

Bonana-fanna fo-fatie

Fee fi mo-matie

Katie!

A verse can be created for any name, with X as the name and Y as the name without the first consonant sound (if it begins with a consonant), as follows:

(X), (X), bo-b (Y)

Bonana-fanna fo-f (Y)

Fee fi mo-m (Y)

(X)!

If the name starts with a b, f, or m, that sound simply is not repeated. For example: Billy becomes "Billy Billy bo-illy"; Fred becomes "bonana fanna fo-red"; Martha becomes "fee fi mo-artha"^[3]

The song as originally performed gives no indication of what to do with names where the stress falls on a syllable after the first, like Anita or Antoinette, but during the live rendition of the song on The Merv Griffin Show, Ellis uses the same rules as explained above ("Tallulah, Tallulah, bo-ballulah").^[5] However, the cover version on the workout video Sweatin' to the Oldies 3 (vocals by Donna Miller) suggests that the first syllable should be dropped after the name is first said; the name Madonna is sung as "Madonna-donna-bo-bonna," etc.

The song's first verse gives Ellis's first name as an example. The other names used in the original version of the song are Lincoln, Arnold, Tony, Billy, Marsha, and Nick. 

The song was used in a series of commercials for Crest Kids Toothpaste in the 1980s.