Istanbul (not Constantinople)
Confessions of a memory collector
A test I took at work last year identified me as a person with a craving for knowledge, someone who likes to collect and archive information. That thirst for knowledge took an unusual direction a few years ago. Have you ever had a song stuck in your head? I’ve had one playing in my head for years. The song is Istanbul (Not Constantinople) sung by the band They Might Be Giants (listen at your own peril). An unfortunate side effect for me has been my need to research and dissect the song as it repeats in my head.
Let us journey back to 27 BC when the Roman Empire began. For several hundred years they ruled most of Europe from their capital in Rome. In 330 the city of Constantinople was created by Emperor Constantine the Great. Constantine thought that the Roman Empire should be split into an eastern and western section. Constantinople became the capital of the eastern Roman Empire. By 500, Constantinople was the largest city in the world and the Western empire had been defeated. What most people don’t realize is that the Roman Empire existed at Constantinople for more than 1000 years.
In 1453, Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman (or Turkish) Empire. People that lived there began to refer to it as Istanbul (and other names) while most of the world still referred to it as Constantinople. The Ottoman Empire was defeated in 1922 and the modern country of Turkey emerged. It wasn’t until 1928 when Turkey’s postal system stopped accepting packages addressed to Constantinople that the rest of the world began to adopt the name Istanbul. However, even in 2016, the Greek word for Istanbul is their spelling of Constantinople.
Now we jump ahead to 1953, the 500th anniversary of the fall of Constantinople. Jimmy Kennedy, a Northern Ireland songwriter, and Nat Simon, an American composer, created the song Istanbul (Not Constantinople). The clever lyrics and rhythm made it popular and it reached #10 in the Billboard magazine charts as sung by the The Four Lads, a Canadian quartet. The song achieved gold record status, meaning it sold over a half a million copies.
(second verse of song)
Every gal in Constantinople
Lives in Istanbul, not Constantinople
So if you’ve a date in Constantinople
She’ll be waiting in Istanbul
A year later in 1954, comedian Jack Benny did a parody of the song on his radio show. Jack Benny was arguably the most popular radio star of his time so it emphasizes how familiar Americans were with the song.
Finally I emerge into the picture. As a young man I watched the animated series Tiny Toon Adventures in 1991 which had Steven Spielberg as the executive producer. Here I saw an animation of the song, Istanbul (not Constantinople), but sung by the band, They Might Be Giants. From that point onward, whenever I heard the song, it took several days to get it out of my head. This caused all the research you’ve been reading.
Still unsatisfied I wondered if the They Might Be Giants song was created specifically for Tiny Toon Adventures. I reached out to They Might Be Giants for the answer and co-founder John Flansburgh was kind enough to reply:
“On our first national tour we were contracted to play two sets of one hour (non-repeating) shows for a gig in Norfolk VA. This was far more songs than we had written or knew how to play. So we set about learning a whole bunch of covers to extend the show, including Why Does the Sun Shine and Istanbul. It was one of the songs my family would sing while my aunt played the piano, and looking it over I realized it was very very easy to play (only two chords) so it got put into the set and we’ve been doing it ever since!”
The They Might Be Giants album Flood which contains the song achieved Platinum status in 2009, meaning over one million copies were sold.
I do not normally get obsessed with a song’s origins but this song travels tiny touch points in history that fascinate me. Now I know why it is Istanbul and not Constantinople. I enjoy the song even more. The research is done and the mysteries are solved but the tune remains a part of me.
