Information about Abc Def Ghi

"ABC-DEF-GHI" is a song sung by Big Bird of Sesame Street. In recent years, it has also been sung by Elmo. It is also erroneously known as "Abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz."

After stumbling upon the Latin alphabet, which was written in chalk on the sidewalk, he mistakes it for a very long word ("abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz"). With marching band-like accompaniment, he breaks into song, pronouncing the "word", as(/æbkədəfgidʒəkəlmənapkwərstuvwɪksɪz/)" His brilliance as a bird, he thinks, will become known to all the world if he can ascertain the word's meaning.

A verse lists Big Bird's assumptions of what the word might mean:

It might be a kind of an elephant

Or a funny kind of kazoo

Or a strange, exotic turtle

That you'd never see in a zoo

Or maybe a kind of a doggie

Or particular shade of blue

Or maybe a pretty flower

Naah, not with a name like that, uh-uh!

The bridge illustrates the daunting task of trying to spell, let alone pronounce the word:

It starts out like an A word, as anyone can see

But somewhere in the middle, it gets awfully QR (pronounced "kwer") to me.

Next, Big Bird's friends appear and Big Bird tries to stand on the chalked "word", as he thinks to himself, nonverbally, "Oh no! Now all my friends will find out about the abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz (as he thinks the word to himself, he pronounces it "(/æbkədəfgidʒəkəlmənapkwərstuvwɪksɪz/)", as typed above) and my fame will not be published throughout the streets of Sesame!". However, his friends manage to worm him into getting off the chalked word and they, together, explore the skullduggery of finding out the meaning of "abb-kuh-deff-gee-jeckel-muh-nopp-kwer-stoov-wix-iz". But each of them have different ideas about how the word should be pronounced, and they all have amazingly far-fetched ideas of the meaning.

Then, after much guessing, they finally find out it's the alphabet.

See also

• The Alphabet song