We Can Sing, We Can Dance is a song from Madeline: Lost in Paris.
The song was composed in D-flat major, then key changes to D major, and then E-flat major.
Plot[]
The 12 Little Girls, along with Miss Clavel, Pepito, Lord Cucuface, the Spanish Ambassador, and the Spanish Ambassadress, all sing about how excellent the school is, in order to convince Uncle Horst to let Madeline stay and not transfer to a school in Vienna.
This, however, ultimately fails to convince Horst, as he later turns out to be none other than a con-man named Henri posing as Madeline's uncle. Throughout the entire song, Henri maintains a dismissive, patronizing attitude towards the children, insisting that the Viennese school is better in every way.
Lyrics[]
11 little girls: We can sing, we can dance, we write poems with compassion
We can draw, we can paint all in true Parisian fashion
We are dainty, proper and well bred
Très très well traveled and très très well read!
We are elegant and cultivated,
Polished and sophisticated
Graceful, musically inclined
Pepito: We can dribble!
Uncle Horst: My, how refined.
11 little girls: We can dance ballet in all positions,
Curtsy for the politicians
Sketch a portrait for the Louvre
Chloe: Sing at the opera!
(operatically) Mi-mi-mi-mi-mi!
Uncle Horst: Hm, how very smooth.
(glass shatters and breaks)
11 little girls: We can swim, we can skate, we can gallop with perfection
We can cook, we can bake, every Cordon bleu selection
We are dainty, proper and well bred
Très très well traveled and très très well read!
Uncle Horst: (quasi spoken) A fine upbringing, you've been givin',
Considering the place you live in,
But, to learn correctly, if you please...
I'll find a teacher who's Viennese.
Miss Clavel: They can weave, they can sew, with the finest silk or satin
Lord Cucuface: They can quote from the classics, in fluent Greek and Latin
Spanish Ambassador's Wife: They are dainty, proper and well bred
Spanish Ambassador: Muy muy well traveled and muy muy well read!
(Pepito plays violin badly)
11 little girls: We can sing, we can dance, we write poems with compassion
We can draw, we can paint all in true Parisian fashion
We are dainty, proper and well bred (Uncle Horst: Nein! Nein!)
11 little girls: Très très well traveled and très très très très très... well read!
Oui oui!
Trivia[]
- This song may be a reference to "Be Our Guest" from Disney's Beauty and the Beast (1991), where one of the lyrics is "They can sing, they can dance, after all miss, this is France!"
- "Nein" means "no" in German, given that "Horst" is "from Vienna," which is the capital of Austria, and German is spoken there.
- "Muy" means the same in Spanish as "très" does in French: "very."