“The tenors were up there screeching, so they sounded like boy sopranos.” He offered to create separate tracks, so that Dozier could eliminate the voices if he desired, “but he liked the idea,” Hefti says, so the chorus stayed.īoth the show and the theme song were successful. The eight singers (four sopranos, four tenors) “sang in perfect unison, not octaves apart,” Hefti said. Hefti recalled the makeup of the band: two trumpets, four trombones, two keyboards, four guitars, a bass, and two drums. In Jon Burlingame’s 1996 book “TV’s Biggest Hits,” Hefti detailed the way the theme song was recorded: I say “seemed to confirm” because Hefti himself disputed this claim. Old pals would call to congratulate me and also to ask, “Are those horns or voices saying ‘Batman’ during your theme song?” (They were horns.) West himself seemed to confirm that in his 1994 autobiography, “Back to the Batcave”:Įveryone was talking or writing about us, wanting an interview, trying to understand and explain the appeal, raving about the innovative camerawork - tilted angles for bad guys - or the lavish sets or Neal Hefti’s catchy jazz score. In the years since the show’s end in 1968, it’s been rumored that the shouts of “Batman!” in the theme song were not voices, but brass instruments. …I was almost going to call them and say, I can’t do it… But I never walk out on projects, so I sort of forced myself to finish. I tore up a lot of paper… It did not come easy to me… I just sweated over that thing, more so than any other single piece of music I ever wrote. Neal Hefti composed the theme song, which consisted of “Batman!” being shouted several times over a blues progression.įor as simple as the theme sounds, Hefti said it was the hardest song he ever wrote: The soundtrack of the show highlighted the camp aesthetic, drawing upon surf music and the film scores from spy films. All of his action sequences were punctuated by onomatopoeia such as “Pow!” and “Bam!” He inhabited a world of bright colors, corny one-liners, and cartoonishly one-dimensional depictions of morality. In comparison to the portrayals of Batman that came before and after the TV series, this version of Batman is considered silly, campy, and hokey.
Though the character had been around for almost three decades, this show was responsible for introducing much of America (and the world) to Batman. In 1966, ABC premiered the television show, “Batman,” with Adam West in the title role and Burt Ward as his sidekick Robin.
Batman tv theme song movie#
Later in the decade, he would be featured in two movie serials: “Batman,” in 1943, portrayed by Lewis Wilson, and “Batman and Robin,” in 1949, with Robert Lowery playing Batman.
The character became popular enough to get his own comic book title in 1940. By day, Wayne was a Gotham City philanthropist by night, he dressed up in a bat-inspired costume and fought criminals. Originally called The Bat-Man, he was the alter ego of billionaire Bruce Wayne. The character of Batman, created by artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, first appeared in “Detective Comics #27” in 1939. You can listen to the songs in a Spotify playlist. Read about it here and see the list of previous songs here. A new post about a different song is posted each Monday. This is the 61st post in a weekly series.
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