Week 1015 Noinks

In Week 1015 of The Washington Post Style Invitational, entrants were asked to submit fictoids — totally bogus trivia — about music and the music world. I got one honorable mention, for "Chubby Checker has a chiropractic degree." Here are my noinks, i.e., the stuff that didn't get published:

W.S. Gilbert's early success as the inventor of the Erector Set freed him of financial concerns as he went on to become England's foremost librettist of comic operas.

The William Tell Overture is about a Swiss poker player.

Despite the rumor that Stephen Sondheim's real name is Oscar Hammerstein III, the fact is that at least four anonymous songwriters using the Sondheim nom de plume have been hired by the League of New York Theatres and Producers since 1950, to improve ticket sales.

The NBC chime -- the notes G, E, and C -- were used originally by RCA founder David Sarnoff to honor English genealogist George Edward Cokayne,  in an attempt to get a peerage. Instead, Sarnoff was made a general.

CBS Producer Don Hewitt, an original member The Dominoes, named his ground-breaking TV newsmagazine, "60 Minutes" after the band's 1951 song "Sixty Minute Man." (You can hear Hewitt here as the second lead: http://youtu.be/vG-wnBJn7Y0 ).

"Doo wah diddy diddy dum diddy doo" is French for "my feet hurt."

The third verse of "The Chicken Dance" is performed at weddings only in Sicily.

Prior to the invention of the tuba, its part in oom-pah music was taken by the glockenspiel.

"It's a Hard Knock Life" was originally in the score of "Pajama Game," but was was cut for time.

Lady Gaga is actually 47 years old.

The Eurovision Song Contest was won in 1975 by Cyprus for Archbishop Makarios' rendition of "Μην νομίζετε ότι είμαι σέξι;" ("Do You Think I'm Sexy?").

Billboard's 1984 Year-End Country and Western song, "To All the Girls I've Loved Before"by Julio Iglesias and Willie Nelson, was written by John Major, who went on to become British Prime Minister.

Patti Labelle claims the Bluebelles' original name was somewhat different, but I think she's teasing.

The Beach Boys grew up in Vermont.

If he had been elected President, Mitt Romney promised to pardon Lil Wayne.

In an attempt to further broaden its fan base, in 2014, one of "The Voice's" judges will be Takuya Kimura of the Japanese idol group SMAP.

In 1989, Adam Levine and Matisyahu were in the same cabin at Camp Tel Yehuda.

Adam Sandler's "Chanukah Song" has never been performed in Israel.

Hoping to restart their careers as East European rockers, the Bay City Rollers are currently in the studio recording a cover of their hit "I Only Want To Be With You" in Serbian.

"Weird Al" Yankovic sold the idea for The Style Invitational to The Washington Post in 1989 as a song parody contest for a proposed all-music edition of the Style Section.

The May 16, 2013, episode of "Glee" will be based on the music of Matisyahu.

Saying it needs to be in a championship city, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum is moving from Cleveland to Miami.

The New York Philharmonic Orchestra has never revealed what the word "philarhomic" means.

The musical genre called "rockabilly" was named after its first practitioner -- "Father Knows Best" actor Billy Gray.