THE SONGS THAT SOLDIERS SING

Evening Post, Volume CXVII, Issue 18, 21 July 1934, Page 25

THE SONGS THAT SOLDIERS SING

England's folk-songs, it has been stated, have taken refuge in "tho fastnesses of taprooms." They come out "shyly, late at night, when the gentry have gone home to bed, when the bar-rack-room has- exhausted its music-hall menu," says a writer in the "Morning Post."

The barrack-room—l wonder? Leaving aside the fact that surviving music-hall-songs are so old as to be themselves classified as folk-music, tentifteen pip-emma can hardly bo "lato at night," any more than the hour at which our-licensing laws compel patrons to emerge from the "fastnesses of taprooms." Kesfc assured, a soldier attempting even the choicest folk-song after,that honr would either be warned by his room-mates, in very old Anglo-Saxon, to "put a sock in it," or bo attended to by the Sergeant of the Quard.

_ Modern dance music has its place just because it is modern.- The musichall comedian was modern in his day though bis song, unassisted by mechanisation, spread more slowly and cndurea longer. Barrack-room soldiering needs careful scoring. "I—ain't got uo-bo-ho-ho-dy," imparts a caressing rhythm to the pipeclay sponge. "Cerrazy people—cer-razy people,'^ puts a savage sting into the eager chain burnisher.

•^f. ..-*?l6 soldier on civilian folkrsoagia,it* is because He has found sonic -words, of his own. "Widaicombe Pair" is popular because," for the authentic string, of names that ends the verse, there can be substituted those of all the' regimental celebrities or notorieties.;., ; Listen, to. the. very sad story of Nth©' jjlatoon with the ultra-pious lieutenant. For his benefit was unearthed a special repertory of marching songs. His response was to summon the^noisiest private of them all. The officer paid compliment to the untrained quality of his men's voices, and" announced the formation, o& a gleo party. Students ' song-books arrived. Thereafter, every afternoon, Sundays included, when the battalion was at rest, the glee party howled "Drink: to ;Me Only" and "The Last-Rose- of Summer." The innocent suffered with the guilty. Tho cottage that housed battalion orderly room contained the, onlyypiano in the village. It, is beUe#d,\that^here;was.coined the phrase; la; guerre;" . An" Expeditionary'r Force' found the thought of stout Teutons buzzing "Die Waett .amVJßhein." through Belgium ictensely. amusing, Madelon aiid j.the Ma^iUa^&^^erejv : .^ Bearte4ly.-an^''-w'6raless'ly'>b*e'caus1 c they lifted^the^feet without humbug. What stranger combination 'could there have

I been than the war chant of the French I Eepublic, and the typical self-abase-ment of "We are Fred Karno's Army?" Today's infantry accepts with' equal joy "Wheezy Anna/ and "There's Something about a Soldier." Both are good marching tunes. The war-timo Army gloried, above all) in the dirges of its own composition. Ribald, or frankly profane, those generally mournful lays portrayed something of the whimsical truth,of the fighting man's soul. "I don't want to die" or "If the sergeant drinks'your rum" were far truer, if oblique, expressions of an unbeatable Army than all that Charing Cross Boad tried to foist upon us. .Strangest of all, in. the war, was the setting by tho troops of their own pidgin French "Apres la guerre finis" to the old eighteenth, century song of the same war. area, "Malbrouek s'en va-t-en guerre." ( . The Tipperary legend is a strange one. An old song even when war broke out, it,almost certainly owed its fame to: a war correspondent, foiled by censorship of his lawful prey. Beissued "with- a patriotic, coyer it was sung everywhere. It even.'-.-penetrated occupied Belgium. One village band that had played to Teuton, audiences': since 1 Brussels fell yet knew it by heart, and 'played it as tho first British troops , inarched in. Heart strings tightened as white-frocked children sang it in clipped English in -alternation with "God Save the King." Music in the Army ceased to; exist officially when the B.E.F. sailed. Characteristically the fighting men .produced in four years many strange variations of unofficial harmony. One. regular bandmaster .joining his regiment overseas jwas confronted with •n combination which must have wrung |Jiis very soiil. . It was strongest in drums, owing to the presence in the ranks of a number of Irish reservists. The M.O.s orderly, a most respectable member of society, remembered a previous incarnation as a tromboneer. Pre-war trumpeters and a Salvationist had unearthed strange and dubious instruments. Tho "Silent ■ Piccolo Player" owed his unassailable position to tho actual ownership of the instrument. There was a fringe of moutliorgans and melodeons who scrabbled for spare band parts. The acting bandmaster blew down one end of a clarionet and beat time with.the other. | Self-supporting ■ this band was. It practised in those estaminets patron- [ ised by the higher non-commissioned ranks. Officers'^messes that were wise sent out the waiter.with a stoup of wine before it produced a note. A brigadier paid ransom one Christmas Eve, on his very billet steps when it had completed "Good King Wenceslas," and was half-way through the "First Noel."'