George Orwell worked for the BBC during W.W. II. He wrote in his diary on 10 June 1942:

"The only time when one hears people singing in the BBC is in the early morning, between 6 and 8. That is the time when the charwomen are at work. A huge army of them arrives all at the same time, they sit in the reception hall waiting for their brooms to be issued to them and making as much noise as a parrot house, and then they have wonderful choruses, all singing together as they sweep the passages. The place has quite a different atmosphere at this time from what it has later in the day."

I'll bet. I'll also bet that that nothing of the kind happens today. I have read in a book that at about the same date (I was 4 years old then) people sang in neighborhood bars in New York City -- not in paid concerts at fixed times, but when one of the regulars who liked to sing happened in & the crowd asked him for a song & joined in on the choruses. Not any more. In the '60s one could still go to a party, not one specifically organized for the purpose of singing, where singing happened as a matter of course. Now, AFAIK, there is no such thing, even in Boston.

Mass entertainment, may its name be blotted out, has noticeably tightened its grip in my lifetime.

--- Joe Fineman    joe_f@verizon.net

||: Piss and fart, Sound at heart. :||