Hank Medress
I used to work in a health food store in New Haven called “Edge of the Woods”. We never quite understood whether the name was chosen because the store was located so close to Edgewood Avenue and the Park that bore the name, or because a few blocks away was one of the worst and most dangerous slums in the city, a spooky place that no one, black or white, wanted to be once the sun went down.
The store was built into an old movie theatre, with a high ceiling and a second floor balcony that ran along the inside perimenter of the building. The vitamin department was up there, as well as the area where the yoga people yoga-ed and the TM people meditated transcendentally. The best part about the job, however, were the enormous, cavernous acoustics. My co-worker Johnny Vega used to shout the Spanish-language profanity “bicho” from one end of the store and laugh as it echoed through the aisles. I had a different take: every time I had to go upstairs to grab something from the supply room, I’d casually walk the entire perimeter singing the falsetto part of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”:
In the jungle, the mighty jungle
The lion sleeps tonight
In the jungle, the quiet jungle
The lion sleeps tonightEeeeeeeeee-e-e-um-um-a-weh
The piercing noise would clang through the produce department, and could usually be counted upon to make at least one shopper jump and/or drop their groceries. Good times, great oldies.
Yesterday, Hank Medress, whose falsetto helped make the song a legend, died. I didn’t get a chance to blog much yesterday, but I figured it was appropriate to honor the guy who brought me so much joy, and who brought so much annoyance to my former boss at Edge of the Woods, who scolded me at least twice about my vocal tribute.
One Response to “Hank Medress”
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June 27th, 2007 at 8:36 am
Thanks Brendan, that was fun and he was kinda cute too.