Kendall: The problem with songs such as the Band played...is, too many people sing it because it is popular, and some have no feeling for the song.
It took me 20 years to be able to sing that song without coming all Untogether as they say in West bygod Virginia.

As someone very new to performing in public (and, TBH, not very good) I can identify with that. The first song I chose to sing unaccompanied in public was Sam Starrett's "John Condon". It took me almost 3 months of daily singing it in private before I could sing it in public without becoming "unglued"....and that despite the fact that early on I discovered that John Condon was 19, not 14, when he died and that the body in his grave is almost certainly that of a 35 year old from another unit.

Despite its probable historical inaccuracy, the song *as a song* "speaks" to me deep down and singing it is very emotional for me.