SINGING TV THEME SONGS

Picture the Cartwright family from “Bonanza” riding onto the Ponderosa singing, “We got a right to pick a little fight, Bonanza! If anyone fights anyone of us, he’s gotta fight with me!” to the tune of the show’s theme song.

Then visualize these big, strong men laughing so hard that they almost fall off their horses.

This actually happened, according to John Javna, author of the recently published “TV Theme Song Sing-Along SongBook.” Javna says that the scene was such a debacle that the show’s creators decided to play the “Bonanza” song as an instrumental.

The original rendition can occasionally be seen on TV blooper shows.

Javna’s 128-page TV song book, released last month, tells of this and other humorous incidents, but mainly it offers the lyrics, and in many cases the music, of 52 TV theme songs and commercial jingles. Included are familiar songs from sitcoms, Westerns, dramas, kids shows, quiz shows and commercials, dating from the ‘50s to the ‘80s.

The book also features pictures from the programs, includes bits of trivia, tells when the shows ran, how they did in the ratings and who was in the cast.

“Often the theme song for a series is more memorable than the show itself,” Javna said during an interview here the other day. “People feel a keen anticipation when they’re waiting to watch a favorite program, and, since the song comes before the show, it becomes a synopsis, the thing that identifies the series.

“This is a nostalgia book,” he added. “I want people to read the lyrics of these songs or dig back in their memories to try to answer the trivia questions and remember what it felt like to get home from work and sit down to one of these shows.

“That’s why I’ve included so few songs from ‘80s programs, because it’s hard to get nostalgic about something that just happened yesterday.”

In tracking down theme songs for the book, Javna, 34, was surprised to learn that the tunes for “Star Trek,” “Leave It to Beaver” and “I Love Lucy” all have lyrics.

“I was also astonished to find out that ‘Green Acres’ started out as a radio show and that ‘Happy Days’ began as an episode on ‘Love American Style,’ ” he said.

Javna, a former street musician and the author of “60s!” and “How to Jitterbug,” picked the songs not on the popularity of the TV shows but on how well the themes are known. Thus, the music and lyrics range from “Mr. Ed” and “77 Sunset Strip” to the commercials “See the U.S.A.” and the “Gillette” look sharp march.

Javna got the idea for the TV book while hosting a trivia championship to promote his “60s!” work.

“I was asking contestants questions in front of an audience, and I asked one of them to sing the song from ‘Petticoat Junction,’ ” he recalled. “Soon the whole crowd joined in, and I realized I wasn’t the only one who liked and remembered these songs, that they were a neglected part of popular culture.”

Javna believes that television theme songs, even commercial jingles, should be thought of as our modern folk music because they reflect cultural attitudes and values and are easily accessible to the masses.

“Take the song from the ‘Beverly Hillbillies.’ It articulates the classic American dream, a poor mountaineer who accidently becomes rich and moves to the promised land of Beverly Hills. It’s no coincidence that that’s the TV theme song people know best,” he said.

Before writing his book, Javna said he tracked down the people who had the rights to the songs he wanted to use, then researched trivia about each show. “Most of the people I talked to were surprised that I wanted to publish their songs. It’s not a request they get often,” Javna said. “Some of them even let me use the music free.”

It was Javna’s turn to be surprised, however, when he found out how many TV theme songs were written by popular composers.

He learned, for instance, that Harry Warren, who wrote the music for “Wyatt Earp,” also wrote “Jeepers Creepers”’ and “We’re in the Money,” and that Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, who wrote the “Mr. Ed” and “Bonanza” songs, also did “Que Sera, Sera,” “Mona Lisa” and “Buttons and Bows.”

He also found that TV themes such as “Welcome Back, Kotter” and “SWAT” became hits on the pop music charts.

With his TV sing-along book now out, Javna is turning his attention to four other books, including a “Son of the TV Theme Song Sing-Along Song Book” due out next fall, a book on cool cars, a rock encyclopedia and the biography of a woman who came up with the idea of making merchandise (Snoopy sweat shirts, dolls and the like) based on the “Peanuts” comic strip.