PATRIOTISM IN SONG.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXII, Issue 147, 22 June 1901, Page 4 (Supplement)

PATRIOTISM IN SONG.

POPULAR AIRS THAT HAYS

INFLUENCED POLITICS.

The influence of political songs wa* the subject of an interesting articla in the "Pall Ma#Gazette."

Macdermott's "We don't want t# fight" was, says the "Pall Mall G*» zette," the most important political song of the last century, at any rati subsequently to the peace of 1815.

"'The Great' Macdermott," says th« journal, "had many successors as ex» ponents of what the music-hall pro* fession calls 'patriotic^.' Between them they damaged the effectiveness of Mr- Gladstone's Government not a little. Miss Vesta Tilley, for example with the triumphs of 'I fairly knocked the Yankees in Chicago,' 'The Picea* dilly Johnny with tJbe little glass eye/ and That's Pa,' still before her, made, in the early eighties, the pertinent inquiry, 'When shall old England bt herself once more?' 'We're not dead yet,' was Mr Ha-fry Ri-ckards' stirring retort, inspired by the battle of Tel-el-Kebir.

"There followed the efflorescence of the tremendous Charles Godfrey with 'Burnaby the hero, Burnaby the brave,' 'Too late, too late to save him* (Gordon), and 'Fighting- with iht Gallant Fusiliers.'

"But it was not until nearly twenty years later that Mr -Albert Christian with 'Soldiers of the Queen' made a hit in any way comparable to thel roof-lifting success of *We don't wan* to fight' And 'patriotics,' when looked upon in the spirit of historical r©? trospect, are found to be no longer? the force that they once were. "Mr Rudyard Kipling's 'AbsentMinded Beggar* has been sung, recited, and ground out on barrel-organs over the whole of the British Empire, but its effect has been by no means so considerable as its Jingo prototype.

"Of the other songs inspired by th«l war, Mr Pat. Rafferty's 'What do yott think of the Irish now?' and thtf Countess Russell's 'Bravo! Dublin Fusiliers" are dead already. Mr Led Stomont carries on much of the Mac* dermott tradition, without his boisterous animation, but with all his capacity for making a'chorus go witß •a oang." 6