Songs About Disease

Subject: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Carolinabugman
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 09:33 AM

I'm looking for music to supplement a series of lectures I'm giving this summer to med school applicants. The lectures are on infectious diseases and I'm looking for songs about tuberculosis, influenza, syphilis and gonorrhea, yellow fever, etc. I want to put my talks in a historical context for this group of primarily African American 25-30 year-olds.

I've found a few but there must be tons more out there. Thanks for ANY suggestions on titles and sources!

[Some song titles in this thread have been converted to links by a Mudelf.]

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:02 AM

Well, the "T B Blues" as recorded by many black artists (I have it done by Memphis Slim) would qualify. Lonnie Johnson's whole family was wiped out by the flu, so he might have recorded something. "Bad Girl's Lament" deals with syphilis. "Arthritis Blues" was sung by Butch Hawes.

Lotsa songs in British tradition dealing with "Eel poisoning" [e.g. "Lord Randall"], but that's a bit off track.

Hope this gets the ball rolling. There are some very knowledgeable folks here and you may be surprised just how many "disease songs" there are. Now whether your audience will find them interesting.....?

Rick

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Jon W.
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:12 AM

"Pills of White Mercury", "The Unfortunate Rake" etc. are a family of songs about syphilis (or was it gonorrhea?)

There was a thread a few months ago on Jake Leg.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,june
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:31 AM

I have vague memories of one where the chorus is to do with "brown Lung disease cough ,cough." and would be grateful if anyone out there can send me the words/chords. [e-mail]

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Ely
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:53 AM

"Mining for Gold" (Cowboy Junkies)--the tune is modern, but the words are traditional and it mentions silicosis.

"Dust Pneumonia Blues"--Woody Guthrie

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Doctor John
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 11:10 AM

Jimmie Rodgers does a different T B Blues. Lonnie Johnson a Toothache Blues. Cyril Tawney one thinly disguised about syphilis but I can't recall its title. Dr John

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Jacob B
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 12:46 PM

"Young Trooper Cut Down in His Prime" deals with syphilis. It's the song the Streets of Laredo was based on.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Metchosin
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 12:51 PM

And the Streets of Laredo was based on Pills of White Mercury, Down by the Royal Albion, and the Unfortunate Rake.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Bert
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 12:55 PM

Noreen Bawn is about tuberculosis, but doesn't actually say so.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Amergin
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 01:02 PM

Well, I know it's not about blacks or anything, but there's the Medical Love Song as sung by Graham Chapman. Can post the lyrics later if you want.....

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Martin Ryan
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 02:25 PM

Was the Cyril Tawney one "Sally Free and Easy"?

Regards

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Wesley S
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 02:27 PM

Can I assume that "Cat Scratch Fever" [Ted Nugent] is out of the question???

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Bert
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 02:34 PM

Oh and don't forget The Welly Boot Song.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: SDShad
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 02:38 PM

A search for keyword @disease on the DigiTrad Lyrics Search above yields a list of six songs, some listed in this thread and some not. Mostly, but not all, about social diseases....

Chris

Subject: Lyr Add: MEDICAL LOVE SONG (Graham Chapman)^^
From: Amergin
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 03:16 PM

Aw, hell, here you go, the lyrics to a lovely love song about diseases:

MEDICAL LOVE SONG
Sung by Graham Chapman
From 'Monty Python's Contractual Obligation Album'
(Expanded version from 'Monty Python Sings')

Inflammation of the foreskin reminds me of your smile.
I've had balanital chancroids for quite a little while.
I gave my heart to NSU that lovely night in June.
I ache for you, my darling, and I hope you'll get well soon.

My penile warts, your herpes, my syphilitic sore,
Your monilial infection--how I miss you more and more!
Your dobies itch my scrum-pox. Ah, lovely gonorrhea!
At least we both were lying when we said that we were clear.

Our syphilitic kisses sealed the secret of our tryst.
You gave me scrotal pustules with a quick flick of your wrist.
Your trichovaginitis sent shivers down my spine.
I got snail tracks in my anus when your spirochetes met mine.

Gonococcal urethritis, streptococcal balanitis,
Meningomyelitis, diplococcal catholitis,
Epidydimitis, interstitial keratitis,
Syphilitic coronitis, and anterior ureitis.

My clapped-out genitalia is not so bad for me
As the complete and utter failure every time I try to pee.
My doctor says my buboes are the worst he's ever seen.
My scrotum's painted orange and my balls are turning green.

My heart is very tender though my parts are awful raw.
You might have been infected, but you never were a bore.
I'm dying from your love, my love. I'm your spirochetal clown.
I've left my body to science, but I'm afraid they've turned it down.

Gonococcal urethritis, streptococcal balanitis,
Meningomyelitis, diplococcal catholitis,
Epidydimitis, interstitial keratitis,
Syphilitic coronitis, and anterior ureitis.

Hope this helps you.

Amergin

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 03:39 PM

You'll get even more results if you search for "disease" instead of "@disease." Also try "sickness". Also check out these old threads:

straight & sober song circle
Folk songs appropriate for medical students
Lyr Req: songs about health
Lyr Req: Anti-smoking songs
Songs about a hospital (for school program)
Lyr Req: Songs about health and safety
Songs about Mental Health
Songs about illness
Songs about global children's health?

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Art Thieme
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:51 PM

Sarah Grey and Ellie Ellis did "Some Little Bug Is Going to Find You".

"The Microorganism"
A great song. Was done by either Boiled In Lead or Cordelia's Dad. (concerns HIV)

"Still Gonna Die"
--- (no matter what you do to stay healthy--eat tofu-quit drinking--lose weight--gain weight--stop smoking etc. etc.) It was done by Bob Gibson on his last CD and was written by Shel Silverstein.

"The Shanty Boy on the Big Eau Claire"
A great ballad of the lumber camps in Wisconsin. It deals with Scarlet Fever. I recorded it twice and Lee Murdock did it on his fine new CD of Great Lakes songs called The Lost Lakes Sailors on Depot Records--Box 11--Kaneville, IL--60144-- [e-mail] (It's on my cassette called On The River) The song is a lumberjack version of Romeo And Juliet

a later verse of the song:

She caught the scarlet fever and lay ill a week or two,
In Asa Baldwin's pest house in the town of Baraboo,
The doctors tried, but all in vain, her helpless life to save,
Now millions of young hop lice are dancing on his grave.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Art Thieme
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 10:54 PM

That should read "her grave" --- not "his grave"

Art

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Pete Peterson
Date: 24 Apr 00 - 11:17 PM

But comically folks-- the Louvin Brothers recorded River of Jordan (which I think Ira wrote). the middle verse runs:

King Naaman was stricken with dreaded leprosy
and he sent for the men of God to pray
but Elisha said to Naaman: "Go dip yourself in Jordan
Let the cool water wash your spots away

It worked, too. Mr Bugman, is this the kind of thing you were looking for?

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: The Beanster
Date: 25 Apr 00 - 01:13 AM

My favorite has always been Todd Rundgren's "You Left Me Sore" about some sort of STD.

Love is infectious
And I was a victim
The worst case you'd ever seen
But now I know no doctor or nurse
Could cure what you gave to me

'Cause you really
You left me sore
You really left me sore now, baby
You messed me up for sure
And I don't mean maybe
'Cause you really left me sore

etc.....

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: IanC
Date: 25 Apr 00 - 08:27 AM

What about "The Fireship". Earlier versions of this are about gonorrhea.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Mrr
Date: 25 Apr 00 - 02:39 PM

And don't forget the old standby, The Draft Dodger Rag (Well, Sarge, I'm only 18, got a ruptured spleen...)

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Susan of DT
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 05:47 AM

Search for @medicine @doctor @illness. Our categories are far from complete, but they can help. The interesting thing about that "Some Little Bug" song that Art mentioned is its age - the song is from 1915.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Art Thieme
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 10:55 AM

"ARTHRITIS BLUES" done by Butch Hawes (Bess Lomax' late husband) on a ten-inch LP for Folkways. Woody was on this album and Pete & many of the other Almanac Singers---plus others.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: L R Mole
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 11:16 AM

Jerry Silverman's The Dirty Song Book" is the most exhaustive compendium of this sort of thing I've ever seen (a Scarborough Book, Stein & Day, first published in 1982). I have no idea whether it's still available, in these oddly-prioritized times, but for a slog from the salacious to the hair-raising, it's hard to beat. Um, difficult to top, um, surpass.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: DADGBE
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 11:37 AM

John Brown's baby had a cold upon his chest,
John Brown's baby had a cold upon his chest,
John Brown's baby had a cold upon his chest,
And they rubbed it in with camphorated oil.

Sang this in summer camp a million years ago. You can guess the melody.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: vindelis
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 12:47 PM

How about Ilkla moor baht tat? (It's on the Digitrad under this title. Or 'A Bunch of Thyme', which contains the line 'The sailor gave to me a rose' - a euphemism for venereal disease. For that very reason, a building called 'Rose Cottage' was to be found in many a dockyard, of olden days. There is also a Nic Jones song that references 'white tin' I think. Yet another euphemism for unsociable disease.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Jacob B
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 02:25 PM

In case anyone is wondering about the true source of Streets of Laredo - "Young Trooper Cut Down In His Prime" and "Pills of White Mercury" are two different titles for the same song. (At least, I assume they are. The version of Young Trooper I've heard has a line in it about "salts of white mercury".)

I thought the "rose that never will decay" in Bunch of Thyme referred to the child that the woman had.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Peg
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 04:48 PM

what about that old leprosy song? my mom used to sing it to me when we were kids...silly song.

Leprosy, it's getting the best of me
there goes my ear, dear, into your beer, dear...
leprosy, it's getting the best of me,
there goes my eyeball into your highball
kiss me quick, there goes my upper lip
there goes my fingernail into your ginger ale...

that is all I remember...

peg

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Abby Sale
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 10:01 PM

One biggie that's often overlooked was America's worst plague. From the "Happy!" file:

Boston: 2 sailors are reported as the first US Spanish flu (ie. originating in China) deaths on 8/27/1918.
Eventually 500,000 US, 22,000,000 world-wide died.

In nineteen hundred and twenty-nine, men an' women sure was dyin',
From de disease what de doctors called de flu.
People was dyin' ev'ywhere; death was creepin' th'ough de air,
For de groans of de sick sure was sad.

"Influenza" from The John and Ruby Lomax 1939 Southern States Recording Trip. Sung by Ace Johnson, Clemens state farm, Brazoria, Texas. http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/lohtml/lohome.html

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Alex
Date: 26 Apr 00 - 11:48 PM

Chris Vallillo on his CD "The Best of All Possible Worlds" wrote "The Cholera Cemetery", a song even Chris admits is depressing and dark. It is based on true newspaper reports of a cholera outbreak in Liverpool, Illinois (on the Illinois River near where Art lives) in July 1849. It has an impressive body count of 13. I think it is a brilliant song and try to persuade him to play it every time I see him play. Most times, he declines, as it is too depressing even for him!

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Kettel
Date: 27 Apr 00 - 09:08 PM

How about the great Frank Zappa's "Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?". I think you'll find that on a Mothers of Invention album called "We're Only In It For The Money". On a more serious note The Highwaymen do a song on their first album called "Jim, I Wore A Tie Today" that's about a guy who dies of a fever.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Mark Cohen
Date: 28 Apr 00 - 06:30 PM

Tom Lehrer's "I Got it from Agnes" -- this is really a song about epidemiology and public health, of course. Courtesy of SDShad in another thread.

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Apr 00 - 07:07 PM

Cat Stevens did a song in which he mentions "the cold house," which I believe refers to the TB ward. Can't recall the name of it, though. Sorry.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: MartinRyan
Date: 28 Apr 00 - 08:45 PM

JacobB

"The Limerick Rake"

Regards

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Apr 00 - 08:06 PM

There must be some songs about Aids. I've never heard any though.

As has been shown already, there are lots of good songs about TB and VD. Not much other than that though. But I've got a feeling there's a Sea Shanty about Yellow Fever.

Of course most times in songs people just fall ill and die, and noone puts a label on it. Unless they say it was abroken heart.

Oh yes, there's a song I wrote which is about flu, at least that's where it started.

They call it the flu, but you don't fly,
just hang around, and wait to die,
it feels like time's just crawling by -
Millennium Flu, it's got to you.
When your body aches, your mouth is dry.
you cry for help, there's no reply,
you pray to live, but you don't know why - Millennium Flu, it's got to you.

For the rest of it - click on The Millennium Flu

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,c.j.uitenbogaard
Date: 30 Apr 00 - 03:28 AM

Chip Taylor did a song on his album "Last Chance" called "(The Coalfields of) Shickshinny". This song starts with: Are your dusty lungs still itching from the inside?

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Noreen
Date: 30 Apr 00 - 06:14 PM

'Sickness and Diseases' (get you down, get you down) written by Richard Thompson, recorded by Fairport Convention many years ago (possibly on 'Angel Delight') would be a good intro to the lecture! I have been told it was used at a VD conference in Scandinavia somewhere.

Interesting thread!

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Art Thieme
Date: 01 May 00 - 11:16 AM

Alex,

Good to hear your voice here again!

The town of ROCKWELL (long gone) was just about destroyed by that cholera outbreak in Chris Vallillo's song. Homes there were occupied by workers from the ALPHA CEMENT CO. (now Illinois Cement)--still producing east of LaSalle, Illinois right along the Illinois Michigan Canal. The canal had mostly been built by Irish workers. The Rockwell folks contracted cholera because they took their water from the Illinois Michigan Canal that connected Lake Michigan to the Illinois River at LaSalle, Illinois.

Cholera had been taking a huge toll on Chicago after that city put raw sewage into Lake Michigan. (19th century) Their answer to the little problem was to reverse the course of the Chicago River so it didn't spew into Lake Michigan. As a result, via canals, it was made to run S.W. to LaSalle. They just transferred their terrible sanitation pollution problems to the good folks of our area here in LaSalle-Peru. The Rockwell population died like flies. Walking through the old cemetery is quite a trip back in time.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Art Thieme
Date: 01 May 00 - 11:24 AM

Neurological damage was caused by Jamaican Ginger---a cheap Jamaican rum. -- It caused the "Jake Leg" phenomenon---a problem that long-term users of the drink developed with the way they walked--along with various mental disabilities. A ton of songs--mostly blues--were written about this "disease" in the early 20th century.

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 01 May 00 - 12:56 PM

Perhaps the most well-known disease song of all was Ring Around the Rosy. If I'm not mistaken, it was about the bubonic plague, which created "buboes" on the skin -- red swellings with a ring around them. I think the "pocketful of posey" referred to some mixture of herbs that people would carry in the belief that they would keep the infection away. And the "ashes, ashes, we all fall down" referred to burning the corpses of the recently departed.

I heard this explanation a long time ago, and may not have all the details right. But I'm sure there's someone on this forum who can correct my errors and fill in the missing pieces.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST,Alex
Date: 02 May 00 - 12:26 AM

Hey Art,

Chris does call it the "town of Liverpool" but I bow to your superior knowledge of the area. I must talk to him at Music in the Wild this year. Where was the town and where is the cemetery?

An interesting story about Chris - did you know he bought an old Church in Astoria? He was using it to do some recordings for the Rural Rte 3 radio show.

We had a team get-together and tried to paint the place one weekend. We only got one side done - the entrance.

As our parting gesture, we altered the sign at the road driveway which read "The Church of Christ". We quite blasphemously removed the final "T" on the sign.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Ship'scat
Date: 02 May 00 - 07:24 AM

Directly to the topic would be:

Some men die of whooping cough and some of diarrhea.
Some men die of syphilis and some of gonorrhea.
But of all diseases known to man, there's none that can compare
With the drip, drip, drip
That comes from the tip of a British Grenadier.

Rule Britania, marmalade and jam
Five Chinese firecrackers up your arsehole
Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam

to the tune of British Grenadier + Rule Britania

Collected from Bob Hitchcock of The Boarding Party, New Saint George and lately, the Vibrocats. It came from his days as a rugby scrumhalf or such.

KC

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Marymac90
Date: 02 May 00 - 09:32 AM

The song June wanted above is "More than a Paycheck" by Sweet Honey in the Rock, about work-related diseases. I haven't got time to transcribe it all now, (email or message me if you still want it) but I'll try to put down the chorus:

I bring home more than a paycheck to my loved ones and family.
More than a paycheck to my loved ones and family.
There's Asbestosis, Silicosis, Brown Lung, Black Lung diseases, (cough!)
And radiation hits the children before they've even been conceived.

There is a REALLY sad song done by June Tabor, from the viewpoint of a woman caring for her dying husband. I think it's "He Fades Away".

There are songs about aids, including two about the Aids Memorial Patchwork Quilt, but I haven't got time to look 'em up right now! (Message me.)

Mary McCaffrey

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: Jacob B
Date: 02 May 00 - 11:35 AM

And of course, there are songs by Si Kahn that are about work-related diseases, such as (I'm Gonna) Go to Work on Monday (One More Time) - but that's off of the original subject of historical songs about infectious diseases.

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: kendall
Date: 02 May 00 - 12:47 PM

I had a Puerto Rican shipmate who used to sing "I am a roving cowboy, I've got the gonorrhea..I got it from Maria..it hurts me when I pee YAAA!! syph too..

Then there is.."Oh your grannie's in the cellar
I'm surprised ye cannae smell her
Making biscuits on a rusty old wood stove
In her eye, there is some matter
That keeps dripping in the batter
And she sneezes every time she blows her nose.. yuk

Subject: RE: Help: Songs About Disease
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Dec 03 - 01:12 PM

Thank you Mary McCaffrey for the note regarding "He Fades Away". I have been looking for the title of that song for about two years and accessed this site for that purpose. Thanks again.

Subject: RE: Songs About Disease
From: Galloping Gwdihw
Date: 06 Dec 13 - 01:35 PM

Art Garfunkel's 'Bright Eyes' is about myxomatosis.
Could be wrong but I think Paul Mccartney's "Somedays' (on his 'Flaming Pie' album) is about Alzheimer's.

Subject: RE: Songs About Disease
From: Jack Campin
Date: 06 Dec 13 - 02:32 PM

Thank you Mary McCaffrey for the note regarding "He Fades Away". I have been looking for the title of that song for about two years and accessed this site for that purpose.

That's by Alistair Hulett.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UWFqFMnonjY (with lyrics)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nnn84PLTDSc (live video)

Michael Smith's "The Dutchman" is a great song about Alzheimer's.

Subject: RE: Songs About Disease
From: mg
Date: 06 Dec 13 - 03:11 PM

One version of Bound Down for Newfoundland the captain dies of smallpox.

A couple of songs about the famine plagues on the ships are on our Songs for our Ancestors CD.

Seems there are remarkably few that come to mind for such a huge problem.

Come to think of it I have one on some fever spreading through an Indian Residential school in Canada (First Nations). Near Cowichan, B.C.