Hi-Yo, Schubert! Score One For The Lone Ranger

Are you ready for another theory about the decline of our children's SAT test scores, the failure of our educational system and the decay of society in the 1990s?

Meet the Lone Ranger Theory.

You may wonder what the Lone Ranger has to do with social decay. Patience, patience. You have to go through a little history first.

Sixty years ago, when the Lone Ranger first bellowed "Hi-yo, Silver!" on the radio, the soundtrack contained wall-to-wall classical music. American radio listeners (and later TV viewers) thought they were just being entertained by cowboy heroism and train robberies.

But all the time, their brains were being infiltrated by . . . Rossini! Wagner! Strauss! Beethoven! Schubert! Nearly all the biggies of classical music, in fact, in around 89 selections that played in the background of fistfights, high-speed horseback chases, cattle stampedes and tearful reunions.

Obscure pieces as well

We're not just talking about the Finale to the "William Tell" Overture, which is undoubtedly the single most recognized piece of classical music in this country. We're talking about an in-depth assortment, including such relative obscurities as Weber's "Abu Hassan Overture," Saint-Saens' "Henry VIII" Finale, and three pieces so obscure that recordings are unavailable: Beethoven's "Leonore Prohaska Funeral March," Flotow's "Alessandro Stradella Overture," and Joseph Hellmesberger II's "Storm Scene."

Those who grew up watching "The Lone Ranger" on TV, in the 221 episodes filmed between 1949 and 1958 (later syndicated), found the wildly popular Masked Man - and his music - making a mightier impression than much of today's throwaway sitcoms and game shows. The only show in town

Frankly, there was not a lot else to watch. We didn't have cable and satellite channels carrying everything from Australian rugby to French drama. No shopping channels offered jogging suits or tennis bracelets, neither of which had been invented yet.

At our house, the whole family clustered around the black-and-white set as Tonto spurred across the plains to warn his beloved Kemo Sabe of the impending ambush.

Like most of today's baby boomers, my friends and I grew up with the "William Tell" Overture in our ears - and a whole lot else, too (including contemporary composers Alberto Colombo, Cy Feuer, Karl Hajos and William Lava), lurking in anonymity on the "Lone Ranger" soundtrack.

We received benevolent doses of classical music, whose intellect-building benefits are only now beginning to be understood. The most recent study attesting this was published last month in the British scientific journal Nature, which reported that California college students who listened to only 10 minutes of Mozart's piano music "significantly improved their performance" in intelligence tests administered immediately afterward.

An enduring effect

If 10 minutes of Mozart makes a difference on your intelligence tests, how about decades of listening to the "Lone Ranger" music, not to mention the zillions of Westerns made during that era which borrowed liberally from the "Lone Ranger" scores?

That music had a strong enough pull for several of today's "Lone Ranger" buffs to send them searching for the musical bits and pieces that accompanied stampedes and sinister doings in the Wild West.

One of the most avid fans, Jim Messina (5206 N. Shirley, Tacoma, WA 98407, in case you're a fan, too), has tracked and assembled a collection of the music over the past 30 years.

Does he think the music has an enduring effect on listeners?

Does the Lone Ranger wear a mask?

"You aren't always aware of what you're hearing," Messina believes, "but it works its way into your consciousness and into your mainstream thinking." And maybe into your IQ, too?

Today's kids don't see and hear that much of the Masked Man and his soundtrack. Is it mere coincidence, or is this responsible for contemporary decay in our society?

Let's take no chances. All we have to do is get hold of the makers of "Beavis and Butt-head," and get them to inject a little Beethoven and Mozart into the background, under what passes for dialogue these days.

Somehow the phrase "Hi-yo Butt-head" seems to lack a little magic. But then, we never did find out what Kemo Sabe really means.