![1970s tv theme songs 1970s tv theme songs](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/sQhwRr_-g50/maxresdefault.jpg)
![1970s tv theme songs 1970s tv theme songs](https://observer.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/04/screen-shot-2016-04-15-at-10-30-47-am.png)
So in the 1950s, the theme song stopped being a big commercial. This whole song goes by - maybe 2 / 2½ minutes long a-and the star of the show has not yet been mentioned,” he said.Īs more people got TVs and advertising rates went up, it got too expensive for one company to sponsor a whole show. “And then,” Thompson said, “they continue to sing a couple of verses that actually enumerate the various levels of gasoline that they have. The show would even have the company’s name, like The Texaco Star Theater, which was sponsored by Texaco oil and gasoline products.Īt the beginning of the Texaco Star Theater, Thompson said, “The curtain opens and there are four guys dressed as gas station attendants, standing in a chorus line.” They begin to sing about being the men from Texaco. All the commercials would be for that one thing. Back in those early years, one company would sponsor a whole show. “In the very earliest days of TV, the purpose of the TV theme song was to actually be the first commercial in the program,” Thompson said.
![1970s tv theme songs 1970s tv theme songs](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71y2S22DjlL._SY355_.jpg)
There are lots of reasons why TV shows have theme songs, but in the earliest years, the theme song had only one point according to Robert Thompson, a professor of television and popular culture at Syracuse University. If you go all the way back to the 1940s, when only a handful of people had television, TV shows have opened with some peppy music – usually with catchy words. They are TV Theme songs, something as old as TV. They can be a song you share with your parents, they can be something you sing with your friends on the bus, and even when you can’t sing them, they get you ready for what’s coming up. Over the years, they’ve been some of the most popular songs in the country. If you’re waiting for something important, you’re glad to hear them. Whether it’s the iCarly THEME (Leave It All To Me), the ESPN BASEBALL theme, the themes from Friends, Sponge Bob or the Brady Bunch, if your home, just hanging around the house, there’s a good chance you’ll hear them.