Dear Doctor, legend has it that Prince Charles plays music to help his flowers grow. I’ve started to think I should try my hand at gardening and grow some marrows. What music do marrows like?
The Doctor has noticed that marrows are very sensitive to sound quality. They are old-school vegetables: they will not respond to MP3s played with iPods through tiny speaker docks – so you need to invest in a mobile record deck. Then proceed to play tunes to encourage large and bulbous fruit and veg (you will get results with more than marrows). Start with tracks like Mongo Santamaria’s Watermelon Man, and Vegetables by the Beach Boys, which has Paul McCartney crunching celery as percussion. A word of warning: this last track may remind your veg that they, too, will end up on your plate, so gauge your plant life’s reaction closely. Be sympathetic.
A sure-fire hit with the cucumber family, in the Doctor’s experience, is Queen Esther Marrow and her honey-toned track, Mama. For something a little more leftfield, go for a corking thumb piano cover of George Harrison’s Within You, Without You by Watermelon Slim & Super Chikan.
Marrow plants seem to love potato songs, too; it could be down to being neighbours in the dirt patch. Play classics like Catch Joe Potato by Porgy Jones, for some funky New Orleans jazz, and follow with Booker T’s My Sweet Potato. This’ll get your tubers and your squash grooving nicely.
One happy byproduct of being the owner of a mobile record deck is the musical picnics you can enjoy, before it gets properly cold. Spread the love with the plants in your park or countryside; unconventional, maybe, but then you really will be going Prince Charles green.
• Listen to Cerys’s playlist, and post your questions, at theguardian.com/music
