War Songs

There were more good war songs written in WW1 than in WW2; not so much war songs as songs wriiten during the war, maybe about bravery and courage but usually light-hearted songs about keeping spirits up. The second world war produced more sentimental songs than the first with Vera Lynn crooning her ballads about the white cliffs of Dover and about seeing you again. The First World War had "Pack up your Troubles" and "There's a Long, Long Trail A-winding" and "Over There" (I like the Caruso version) and "It's a Long Way to Tipperary" and "Keep the Home Fires Burning" which Ivor Novello wrote before his mother could get her own song, "Keep the Flags A-Flying", onto the market place - he didn't fear the competition so much as the shame he might have felt if she had put out for general consumption her god-awful piece of work.
But the best song of all, according to some experts (who are they I wonder?) is "Roses of Picardy". Melody by Haydn Woods who was a great light classical composer and words by Fred Weatherly. Fred who? Well, he was not a professional lyricist but wrote them in his spare time. Famous in his day but largely forgotten now except for two songs: the lyrics for "Roses of Picardy" and the more famous lyrics for The Londonderry Air the music of which was a traditional folk song. Other lyricists had written words for both songs but none were as acceptable to music publishers as those by Weatherley. "Roses of Picardy" was written I think for the sort of parlour tenor like Webster Booth whose diction was perfect and who pronounced R's clearly with rolling effect; but many other different types of singer sang the song from John McCormack to Buddy Greco.
Again, The Londoderry Air, or as it came to be known after Weatherley's lyrics were added, "Danny Boy", was also much recorded - I recall its being a song sung on the street in John Ford's Irish film "The Informer" no doubt Ford believing it to be a pure Irish air. Certainly sounds it; but actually Fred Weatherly didn't have an Irish drop of blood in him: he was a QC who lived and worked in the west of England.
But what a song "Roses of Picardy" is; so simple, so sweet, nothing sentimental about it, romantic yes, as romantic as anything the Second War came up with.
"Roses are shining in Picardy,
In the hush of the silvery dew,
Roses are flow'rin in Picardy
But there's never a rose like you,
And the roses will die with the summertime
And our paths may be far apart,
But there's one rose that dies not in Picardy,
'Tis the rose that I keep in my heart."