7 most memorable musical TV episodes

Grey’s Anatomy: “Song Beneath the Song”

Probably the oddest entry in this list is this episode that happened during the hospital drama’s seventh season.

Show creator Shonda Rhimes said she had wanted to do a musical TV episode for a long time, but

"We needed it to make sense for our show. Plus, I had to convince the network, which took me seven years."

When Grey‘s finally got its musical moment, the episode centered on the hallucinations of Dr. Callie Torres (Sara Ramirez). After a horrific car accident, Callie starts to see her colleagues, as well as a version of herself, singing.

Ramirez is a Tony winner (for Spamalot) and a few of the other cast members have musical experience, or at least, passable singing voices. So the show’s songs were mostly tackled by these actors.

That meant that the show’s leads had far less screen time than they often did in other episodes. Ellen Pompeo’s Meredith Grey only crooned a couple of verses, while Patrick Dempsey’s Derek Shepherd and Sandra Oh’s Cristina Yang didn’t sing at all.

The songs were covers of background music that had previously appeared in the show. These included songs that the show helped make hits like Snow Patrol’s “Chasing Cars” and a big operating room group sing to The Fray’s “How to Save a Life:”

All in all, the episode received mixed reviews, with some critics feeling the musical conceit worked and others thinking it landed with a thud.