The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins” (aka 2 minutes and 18 seconds of horror) is a song composed by Charles Randolph Grean and performed by Leonard Nimoy, telling the story of Bilbo Baggins and his adventures in J. R. R. Tolkien’s novel The Hobbit. The recording originally appeared on The Two Sides of Leonard Nimoy, the second of Nimoy’s incredible albums on Dot Records.

A year before the recording was commercially released, Nimoy lip-synched to the recording during a guest appearance on the July 28, 1967 episode of Malibu U, a short-lived variety television series. This gave birth to the wondrous piece of history we present here today. If only Nimoy had made more music videos to go along with his music, its a real shame we can’t see more productions of this quality. Its a real mystery why this song wasn’t used in Peter Jacksons 3,000 hour epic, Lord of the Rings.

We’ve cleaned up the audio a bit to further your enjoyment.

Unfortunately this video was edited for some unknown reason, to see the entire clip in black and white this follow this link:

The Musical Touch of Leonard Nimoy – Ballad of Bilbo Baggins!