The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #38012   Message #532786
Posted By: The Walrus
21-Aug-01 - 06:24 PM
Thread Name: Lyr Req: Downfall of Paris?
Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Downfal of paris?
We might be on slightly different wavelengths here as there seem to be several (related)tunes called "Downfall of Paris" and possibly (probably?) some unrelated ones.
The first one I know of is merely a retitling of the French "Ça Ira" ( If this is the one, there are, AFAIK no English lyrics), this became a British Regimental march in the 1790s, when one regiment (33rd Foot?) attacked using the same insistant drum beat, as the Colonel was reputed to have ordered "We'll beat the Frenchies with their own damned tune". The same tune was mutated into a march proper (as opposed to a "pas de charge") and was played by various bands as they passed by the assorted royals & military leared after Paris fell in 1814 (The most autocratic of monarchs Czar Alexander, Kaiser Franz(?) and Fredric Wilhelm of Prussia with Wellington and assorted general officers being seranaded by bands playing what was once the bloodiest of revolutionary anthems). As far as I can tell, the march mutated into at least one fiddle tune, and another march. That's without other unrelated tunes which used the same title (Remember the RTevolutionary/Napoleonic wars lasted something like 26 years).

Regards

Walrus