"Minuetto Allegretto" is a single released from their second album, Remember You're a Womble in 1974 by the Wombles. It was written by Mike Batt and Chris Spedding about Bulgaria as a lad in 1780s listening to classical music and dreaming to become a great composer and conductor. It peaked at number 16 and stayed in the UK singles chart for 9 weeks from October 1974.
The song is based around Mozart's "Minuetto Allegretto", the third movement of his Symphony No. 41. The symphony was first performed in August 1788, so the lyric "back in 1780" has a little artistic licence.
Symphony 41 is nicknamed "Jupiter" due to the thunderbolt-like sounds in the first movement, not to be confused with the entirely different Holst "Planets Suite" composition of the same name from 1918.
Lyrics[]
Back in 1780
When Bulgaria was a lad
There was minuetting in the morning
And the evening they were minuetting mad!
Mister minuetting Mozart
Was the talk of the town
And forgetting to be minuetting
Was letting the other minuetters down
Oh, Womble to your partners
Young Wombles were told
If you Minuetto Allegretto
You will live to be old
Young Womble Bulgaria
Was listening with glee
"If I Minuetto Allegretto
A very old wise Womble I shall be"
Minuetting minutes later
He was Wombling away
Though he used to Womble Allegretto
Now it's Andante Cantabile
Oh, Womble to your partners
Young Wombles were told
If you Minuetto Allegretto
You will live to be old
When the other Wombles were asleep
At the dead of night
He'd become a better minuetter
By practicing in the candlelight
Wimbledon was aware
There was none that could beat
This incredible and amazing
Young Womble with minuetting feet
Oh, Womble to your partners
Young Wombles were told
If you Minuetto Allegretto
You will live to be old
Oh, Womble to your partners
Young Wombles were told
If you Minuetto Allegretto
You will live to be old