David in Livingston, Montana, heard a 1954 radio show in which Frank Sinatra used the phrase sweet and groovy, like a nine-cent movie. Was the word groovy really around in those days? Yes, by 1937, the term had filtered into the mainstream from the language of jazz, where groovy was a compliment applied to musicians with excellent chops. Surprisingly enough, long before that groovy meant “boring,” and applied to someone stuck in a rut. This negative sense of the word goes back to at least the 1880s. A 1920 newspaper article used groovy as a noun, referring to someone who doesn’t like anything that requires them to change their habits. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Groovy Slang Origins”
Hi there, you have A Way with Words.
Hi, this is David Jambra.
Hi, David.
Calling from Livingston, Montana.
Livingston, Montana.
Well, welcome to the show, David.
How can we help you?
I was listening to a radio show a long time back.
It was Frank Sinatra.
He was playing a detective.
And he said, it was from 1954,
He said the phrase, sweet and groovy, like a nine-cent movie.
And I didn’t realize that word had been in use in the early 50s.
And I was very curious what the earliest usage of the word groovy, you know, what year that was kind of.
What kind of context was he saying that in?
He played a character that was, you know, kind of a hep cat, you know.
So it was sweet and groovy, like a nine-cent movie?
Correct.
Okay. And it was positive, overall positive.
Oh, yeah.
And actually, groovy had already been around as a slang term,
Meaning generally positive or cool or with it or hip,
For a couple decades already.
By 1937, it had come up from jazz as a positive term.
In jazz, groovy meant that you were able to swing,
That you could really play.
You had chops.
You had your bones.
You knew how to find an improvisational groove and just really play hard and cool.
And that you could put down some kind of music that other musicians could get into with you and that they could groove on to.
And you could do it for a really long time.
And that was what groovy was.
And then that was borrowed out of jazz into the regular slang vernacular.
But do you want to hear something even cooler than that?
Even groovier than that.
Sure.
David, before there was the slang groovy that meant cool,
Groovy used to mean boring.
That’s interesting.
Oh, yeah, get stuck in the groove.
Yeah, exactly.
Okay, like in a rut.
Yeah, exactly.
As early as the 1880s, to be groovy meant exactly that,
To be stuck in a groove or to be stuck in a rut.
And so you’ll find newspaper articles.
Here’s one from the 1920s.
It talks about a groovy as a noun.
It’s a person who doesn’t like anything that requires him to change his habits.
It says he is apt to make it hot for any member of his family who becomes modern.
For modern things irritate the groovy.
They interfere with his mental and physical laziness.
The groovy is usually against progress and reform in his community, too.
The groovy is a terrible person, sounds like.
I love how words change all the time.
That’s fascinating.
But then by the 1930s, that old sense of groovy as a boring person
Or as an adjective meaning boring disappeared,
And groovy became an adjective meaning cool or with it or hip.
So the jazz musicians took it kind of and flipped it over
To make it something really good.
I think it was independently derived.
They both come from the sense of being in the groove,
But one is a positive groove and one is a negative groove.
All right.
How about that?
Well, thank you so much.
Yeah, Groovy.
Thanks, David.
Thank you.
Bless you.
Now I’m seeing all these psychedelic colors, you know,
And the letters for Groovy, like, you know.
Oh, from the 1960s.
Distended, yeah, kind of Peter Max or something.
I’m not thinking of that.
You’re not?
No, I’m thinking of Swing Street, New York City,
Rainy sweat streets, the dark smoky jazz clubs.
I’m thinking of groovy back when groovy was a new slang word, you know.
You walk down these steps, there’s a bouncer at the door, maybe they’ll let you in, maybe they won’t.
You can barely see through the mush of the crowd.
It’s sweaty and smoky, right?
That’s the groovy I’m thinking of.
Okay.
I’m picturing my Simon and Garfunkel album.
We’d love to hear your questions about language, so call us.
