One can only imagine what Frank Loesser (composer of Guys and Dolls, among other works) was thinking when he penned the lyric to “That Sentimental Sandwich.” Get something written by lunch, most likely, although “I’m hungry for something but it seems so far away / That sentimental sandwich that we shared one day” may speak to some deeper emotion. Justin Hayford, who will sing it at Davenport’s Piano Bar and Cabaret the first four Saturdays in March, says, “There are always a few songs [in the show]…that I throw in because they’re so delightfully terrible.”
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“That Sentimental Sandwich” might be moldier than most of the other 25 songs that Hayford will resurrect in A Rare Find III: Still More Forgotten Gems from the American Popular Songbook. It may not be as touching as Harold Arlen’s “I Could Be Good For You,” or as rousing as “In Gilly Gilly Ossenfeffer Katzenallen Bogen by the Sea.” But Hayford doesn’t necessarily look for material to mock. “It’s easy to find unknown songs,” he says. “It’s hard to find unknown songs that have got some real spark behind them.”
Hayford’s aversion to music began in childhood when, he recalls, “We had to sing ‘Happy Birthday to You’ in as-many-part harmony as there were people around the table. And this drove me crazy, I hated this. I would defiantly sing the melody no matter what.”
However, he adds, “You can’t sing ‘That Sentimental Sandwich’ straight. You have to wink at that song.”
