Yamaha DGX670 #E-3.4 Entertainment P3 SwingFox Tempo: 150 Ending: Good
Giorgio Moroder, pseudonymously credited to "The Great Unknowns" (#55 in 1968)
Key of C
"Mah Nà Mah Nà" is a popular song by the Italian composer Piero Umiliani. It originally appeared in the Italian film Sweden: Heaven and Hell (Svezia, inferno e paradiso). On its own it was a minor radio hit in the United States and in Britain, but it became better known internationally after it was used by the Muppets and on The Benny Hill Show.
Sesame Street producer Joan Ganz Cooney heard the track on the radio and decided it would be a perfect addition to the show. The song's first Sesame Street performance by the Muppets was performed by puppeteers Jim Henson, Frank Oz and Loretta Long (Susan) on the fourteenth episode of the show, broadcast on November 27, 1969. The following Sunday, Henson and his Muppets performed the song on The Ed Sullivan Show. Seven years later, the song was part of the premiere episode of The Muppet Show.
Although Umiliani used a very similar theme in 1966 for the soundtrack of the Italian film Ring Around the World, "Mah Nà Mah Nà" debuted as part of Umiliani's soundtrack for the Italian mondo film Sweden: Heaven and Hell (1968), an exploitation documentary film about wild sexual activity and other behaviour in Sweden. The song accompanied a scene in the film set in a sauna which gave its original title "Viva la Sauna Svedese" ("Hooray for the Swedish Sauna").
