My Monday’s Music Moves Me post today is deeply personal for me as I’ve put together a playlist of Songs about Greyhounds. As most of you know, greyhounds are the loves of my life and have been since 1999.
I was recently invited to participate in a wonderful event put on by the Central Texas chapter of Greyhound Adoption League of Texas (GALT-CenTx), (formerly known as Greyhound Pets of America-Central Texas (GPA-CT)). As an Animal Chaplain, I was extremely honored to do a Blessing of the Greyhounds prior to the Great Global Greyhound Walk.
The Great Global Greyhound Walk is an annual dog-walking event that aims to raise the profile of rescued and retired (ex-racing) greyhounds, showing the world what beautiful companions these dogs make. The event primarily involves hundreds of organized “walks” across the globe, all taking place on the same day.
Originally the event was known as the Great British Greyhound Walk, which started in 2010 but in 2016, the event went global and groups all over the world were coming together to celebrate greyhounds (and other sighthounds), to raise awareness of hounds in need and to continue to promote greyhounds as pets.
Yesterday (Sunday, June 10th) our group had the event at a lovely local lake (Lake Pflugerville, a reservoir in the Austin suburb of Pflugerville) with a wonderful turnout: 66 greyhounds and 1 sighthound (or 64 greyhounds and 3 sighthounds…not sure which); that incredible success puts us at 2nd place, just behind a Cincinnati group who had 73 hounds turnout. How cool!
Pre-Walk group photo of GALT-CenTX members and their hounds
It was a wonderful day. It was truly an honor to give a Blessing to the group prior to the walk and I so enjoyed the individual dog blessings that I gave as folks returned from the 3-mile walk. I find it very intimate and very spiritual to have that momentary heart connection with the dogs as I whisper a blessing in their ear, look into their eyes and end with a “God Bless You” and a sign of the cross on their beautiful heads. I also had fun handing out the treat bags I put together for the dogs and their people: pretty organza drawstring bags containing treats for the dogs, a St. Francis prayer card and a St. Francis medal for the dogs’ collars. I also had lovely Star of David charms so folks had their choice.
I wanted to continue the mission of the event – to bring awareness of the breed, their plight and to promote greyhounds as pets – over to my Monday’s Music Moves Me post so I searched for songs about greyhounds. Who knew there would be so many?! I wanted to share my favorites here with you.
Click on my Greyhound Songs playlist to listen to some music you’ve probably never heard before. It’s rare to find songs about greyhounds specifically and I was thrilled when I discovered these! Be sure to give each a listen. And for sure check out the associated videos. They’re priceless!
Song info:
- Greyhound (Lazy Song) – this song is a wonderful video of various greyhounds set to the Bruno Mars song “The Lazy Song”
- Born to Run by Nancy Simmonds (from Greyhound, Born to Run album)
- The Race by Matt Dahan – Forever Home Greyhounds used this song for one of its videos
- The Greyhound Song
- Miami by Nancy Simmonds – a song about a retired track greyhound from Simmonds’ album Musical Tails, 3rd Litter. Greyhound advocate group Grey2K USA used this song in a campaign to end greyhound racing in America.
- Greyhound by Nancy Simmonds from her Musical Tails, 5th Litter album
A fun discovery:
Singer/Songwriter Nancy Simmonds has recently completed over 118 purebred dog songs, which are designed to celebrate and honor our canine companions. The series is entitled Musical Tails and has been made available for download from iTunes.com. Designed to reflect the individual personality, temperament and history of each breed these songs have been known to make pet owners smile, laugh and cry.
“One of the greatest rewards of producing these songs has been seeing the reaction from pet owners as they listened to the lyrics describing their pet’s breed,” said Nancy Simmonds, a long time pet owner herself. “What I gave through writing the songs I got back many times over in smiles.”
Nancy began composing dog breed songs in the early 1990’s in Carpinteria, California, after discovering that no similar music existed. “I began madly writing about the popular breeds,” she said. “I loved the process of learning the history of each dog, its terrain, the purpose for which it was bred and then in many cases, I tried to study the music that came from the country of the dog’s origin. After years of writing ‘real songs’ in the music business it turned into a great big fun adventure.
To date Nancy has completed songs for many well-known breeds like the German Shepherd, Golden Retriever, Labrador Retriever, Pug, Dachshund, Poodle and Shih Tzu. Her collection also includes song for rarer breeds like the Kuvasz, Basenji, Afghan Hound, Rhodesian Ridgeback, Norwegian Elkhound and the Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever.
While Nancy has had a successful musical career for over 35 years, her passion has always been for her dog songs. “I think these songs help pet owners celebrate & appreciate their four legged friends,” Nancy said. “It seems I could be busy for a long time recording all the registered breeds – and that that makes me one lucky writer!”
Just for your enjoyment, here are some other cool and comical greyhound videos. All of them are short so you have time to watch them!
Cal the Greyhound – Looking for a Long-term Commitment: In 2008, the Greyhound Project produced a series of public service announcements to promote greyhound adoption. One of the spots, seen here, featured a black greyhound named Cal who was looking for a long term commitment. Fortunately for Cal, he was adopted soon after filming.
A Greyhound named Mosley does zoomies in the snow while wearing his Batman pajamas. I crack up every time I watch this video! And I am totally on the hunt for these Batman pajamas as I want to buy some for my boys…so if you ever come across them online, email me immediately!
Greyhounds Playing in Leaves: Greys Bree & Bit play in a pile of leaves on a sunny Autumn day.
Lemon the Greyhound: a greyhound named Lemon described by her owner. Hilarious!
Greyhound sings to the HALO theme song: This is River, a 7-year old greyhound who sings to the theme song of the HALO video game. Per his owner, “River won 7 of his 34 career races. He spends most of his retirement time doin’ nothin’ … and singin’ every now and then.”
Greyhounds Home Alone: This is a time-lapse video showing greyhounds home alone activity…
I hope you enjoyed my Songs about Greyhounds post. Do you have some favorite greyhound songs or videos that you want to share? f you attended the event yesterday, I’d love to hear about your experience and your favorite part. Tell me in the Comments section below.
Monday’s Music Moves Me (4M) is a blog hop hosted by Marie of X-Mas Dolly, and co-hosted by Cathy of Curious as a Cathy and Stacy of Stacy Uncorked Two other co-hosts recently joined the fun: Alana of Ramlin’ with AM and Naila Moon of Musings & Merriment with Michelle. Be sure to stop by and visit the hosts and the other participants listed below:
Angels Bark 