Origins: By the Beautiful Sea (Atteridge/Carroll)

Subject: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 01 May 01 - 01:06 PM

A second grade teacher at my school is beginning her annual oceanography unit and has asked me for the complete words to:

By the sea, by the sea,
By the beautiful sea....

I haven't a clue. Fortunately I don't think she wants me to teach it!

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: IanC
Date: 01 May 01 - 01:09 PM

Hi!

Here:

Beautiful Sea

Cheers!
Ian

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 01 May 01 - 01:28 PM

Thanks!! That's terrific!

Subject: Lyr Add: BY THE BEAUTIFUL SEA (Atteridge/Carroll)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 08 May 02 - 01:24 PM

First verse and chorus copied from http://www.melodylane.net/sea.html

BY THE BEAUTIFUL SEA
(Words, Harold R. Atteridge. Music, Harry Carroll. 1914)

Joe and Jane were always together.
Said Joe to Jane, "I love summer weather,
So let's go to that beautiful sea.
Follow along! Say you're with me!"
Anything that Joe would suggest to her
Jane would always think it was best for her.
So he'd get his Ford,
Holler, "All aboard!
Gosh, I want to be—

CHO: By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea!
You and me, you and me, oh how happy we'll be!
When each wave comes a-rolling in
We will duck or swim,
And we'll float and fool around the water.
Over and under, and then up for air
Pa is rich. Ma is rich, so now what do we care?
I love to be beside your side, beside the sea, beside the seaside,
By the beautiful sea.

[The Levy Sheet Music Collection reveals that there is a little-known second verse. However, 2 pages are missing from the sheet music, so I can only show you how it starts:]

Joe was quite a Sport on a Sunday.
Though he would eat a Childs on a Monday
And Jane would lose her millionaire air....

[Now, can anyone supply the lyrics for the equivalent song that seems to be well known in Britain but unknown in the US—whose chorus begins, "I do love to be beside the seaside. I do love to be beside the sea"? Similar though it sounds, it is really a quite different song, and probably from the same era.]

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: masato sakurai
Date: 08 May 02 - 07:10 PM

From the sheet music (1914), which is reproduced in Sandy Marrone, The Saint Louis Blues and Other Song Hits of 1914 (Dover, 1990, pp. 6-10).

BY THE BEAUTIFUL SEA

Joe and Jane were always together,
Said Joe to Jane, "I love Summer weather,
So let's go to that beautiful sea,
Follow along, Say you're with me!"
Anything that Joe would suggest to her,
Jane would always think it was best for her,
So he'd get his Ford,
Holler, "All aboard
Gee! I want to be."

CHORUS:
By the sea, by the sea, by the beautiful sea,
You and I, you and I, oh! how happy we'll be,
When each wave comes a-rolling in,
We will duck or swim,
And we'll float and fool around the water,
Over and under, and then up for air,
Pa is rich, Ma is rich, so now what do we care?
I love to be beside your side,
Beside the sea, beside the seaside,
By the beautiful sea.

Joe was quite a sport on a Sunday.
Though he would eat at Childs on a Monday,
And Jane would lose her millionaire air,
And go to work, Marcelling hair,
Ev'ry Sunday he'd leave his wife at home,
Say "It's bus'ness, honey, I've got to roam,"
Then he'd missing his train,
Get his Ford and Jane,
And say "Come with me."

~Masato

Subject: Lyr Add: I DO LIKE TO BE BESIDE THE SEASIDE
From: GUEST,macca
Date: 08 May 02 - 09:08 PM

Jim Dixon... Oh why did you ask about the British "Beside the Seaside"? Oh how that takes me back to those happy days gathered round the old steam wireless while Billy Cotton and Co and every other music-hall oriented crooner and all their friends, enemies and associated hangers-on would sing...

Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside
I do like to beside the sea.
I do like to stroll upon the prom, prom, prom,
Where the brass band plays,
Tiddley-om-pom-pom.
Oh, I do like to be beside the seaside,
I like to be beside the sea,
And there's lots of girls beside,
That I'd like to be beside,
Beside the seaside, beside the sea.

There may have been other words, but I usually managed to get out of the room in time. Not only that but some clown "..at the keyboard of the mighty Wurlitzer..." would also try hammering it out time after time while massed battalions of British holidaymakers with handkerchiefs on their heads and their trousers rolled up joined in for umpteen repetitions.

I'll probably never forgive you......

Subject: Lyr Add: I DO LIKE TO BE BESIDE THE SEASIDE
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 10 May 02 - 12:04 PM

Macca: Thanks for setting me straight on the lyrics. I thought it was "I Do Love..." and that's probably why I failed to find it on the Internet. I enjoyed your description of "holidaymakers with handkerchiefs on their heads..." It reminds me of something I might have seen on Monty Python, or something Hyacinth Bucket's brother-in-law Onslow might do. I'm afraid we Americans might miss some of the humor in those programs because we haven't seen the originals that are being parodied. My brother-in-law, who once worked as a barman at a Butlins Holiday Camp, has filled me in on some of the details, but there are others I'm eager to learn. For instance, I believe there is a whole slew of old music hall songs that might be familiar (to the point of nausea in some cases) to everyone in Britain but are virtually unknown in America. Other examples: "Knees Up, Mother Brown," "Maybe It's Because I'm a Londoner," and "The Bull and Bush." I'll probably start a thread on that subject someday.

Commentary copied from http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/coastline/visit/seaside_holidays.html

"I Do Like To Be Beside the Seaside" was composed in 1907 and first made famous by music hall artiste Mark Sheridan in the 1920s. It became a perennial favourite of holidaymakers, not least because it was almost the signature tune of Reginald Dixon MBE who entertained holiday crowds on the mighty Wurlitzer organ at Blackpool Tower Ballroom for 40 years between 1930 and 1970.

A midi is available here: http://www.choirmidi.nl/mids/besidese.mid

Lyrics copied from: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/clarissa/draft05.html
(In the midst of a scholarly dissertation whose abstract begins, "Following a super summer holiday I decided to explore the experience of being at the seaside and writing about it...")

I DO LIKE TO BE BESIDE THE SEASIDE
(John A. Glover-Kind, 1907)

Everyone delights to spend their summer's holiday
Down beside the side of the silvery sea.
I'm no exception to the rule. In fact, if I'd my way,
I'd reside by the side of the silvery sea.
But when you're just the common or garden Smith or Jones or Brown,
At bus'ness up in town,
You've got to settle down.
You save up all the money you can till summer comes around,
Then away you go
To a spot you know
Where the cockle shells are found.

CHO: Oh! I do like to be beside the seaside.
I do like to be beside the sea!
I do like to stroll upon the Prom, Prom, Prom!
Where the brass bands play: "Tiddely-om-pom-pom!"
So just let me be beside the seaside.
I'll be beside myself with glee.
And there's lots of girls beside
I should like to be beside
Beside the seaside!
Beside the sea!

William Sykes, the burglar, he'd been out to work one night,
Filled his bag with jewels, cash, and plate.
Constable Brown felt quite surprised when William hove in sight.
Said he: "The hours you're keeping are far too late."
So he grabbed him by the collar and lodged him safe and sound in jail.
Next morning, looking pale,
Bill told a tearful tale.
The judge said, "For a couple of months I'm sending you away!"
Said Bill: "How kind!
Well! If you don't mind
Where I spend my holiday!" CHO.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: GUEST,macca
Date: 13 May 02 - 01:28 AM

So there were more words.... Damn!

Jim Dixon, how dare you... handkerchiefs and rolled up trousers - that was no parody... that was for real!!!! And a frightening experience it was too. I remember being taken to Blackpool, the jewel of the north-country riviera, in the fifties and being quite frankly astonished.

There they were, massed ranks of otherwise respectable citizens, some in the fair-isle jumper beloved of the Monty Python crew, but some in suits and waistcoats with their trousers rolled up, standing at the shore-line while the water splashes around their ankles. Women tended to be more decorous of course, staying demurely in the background, guarding the offspring trying to dig their way to China or gnawing sticks of rock with loopkcalB written through it. Mind you, some of the more daring of the ladies would take off their stockings and also stand in the water. Gad, the sheer effrontery.

Back home in puritan-ridden Scotland, I would never have dreamed that such scenes of wicked debauchery and riotous behaviour could have been permitted in public... and on the Sabbath day forbye.

No, we children of the northern lands would be taken to our local sea-side spot on occasional Saturdays in the bathing season and dressed in knitted wool dark blue swimming trunks which, when wet, absorbed at least three gallons of water and then threatened to fall with a "splush" around your ankles as you walked out of the water. All this before the critical eye of every other child for twenty miles around. Oh, and if this garment stayed up, by the time you got back to shore, the waterlogged mass of fabric had drooped to the point that the crotch was roughly between the knees, and when you sat down, the sound and sensation was pretty well indescribable. And the worst of it was.... you were expected to enjoy the whole experience!

From scenes like these, mighty Scotia's grandeur springs.... and they also explain why I hated the sea-side then and now, even though I live in a part of the world claimed to have some of the best beaches in the world.

PS - Dixon eh? You're not related to Reginald of the mighty Wurlitzer and the Blackpool Pier then? Because if you are, rest assured that you'll be found out and hunted down one of these days.....

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: DMcG
Date: 13 May 02 - 04:17 AM

Spot on, macca! All you left out was that when "some of the more daring of the ladies would take off their stockings" they would, at least in the North East of England, tuck the bottoms of their dresses into their knickers to keep the dress dry.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: GUEST,macca
Date: 13 May 02 - 05:56 AM

DMcG - Are you sure? .... into their !!!! nether garments !!!! - Oh horror!! Were there no limits to the depravity of these frequenters of the seaside resort... I must have averted my gaze.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 13 May 02 - 11:39 PM

No, I don't think I'm related to Reginald Dixon. My ancestors have been in America for several generations. But I'm proud of any of my clan, however distant and unknown, who makes a name for himself (and me) for anything as innocuous as playing a silly song ad nauseam.

Macca, I think it's time you got over your bad memories of the seaside. I understand there's a clothing-optional beach at Brighton, the perfect antidote. Worst-case scenario: Your old bad memories will be replaced by new bad ones. If Brighton isn't your cuppa, France is only a short ferry-ride away. Forget the Brighton rock and jellied eels. I recommend the moules marinière at Dieppe.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Non-Folk: By the Sea
From: GUEST,ozmacca
Date: 14 May 02 - 12:28 AM

Ah well Jim, I know how you feel. My ancestors have been out here in Down Underland for.. well... My descendants will be able to say that their ancestors etc etc etc, and of course, our lot's claim to fame is that we conducted a highly developed form of agricultural insurance and a mutual assistance and property protection system based on the contemporary evaluation of cattle. This was a very popular economic enterprise for some centuries (well, we liked it) until the government decided to stamp out private enterprise and showed the good sense to get some o' thae hairy wild heilanders intae a uniform.

Thanks for the suggestion about ridding myself of my allergy to the sea-side, but I don't think I could ever take Brighton seriously... not that I try to take many things seriously anyway... after all those terrible old innuendoes about Brighton at the week-end, which could only be aggravated by a "clothing optional beach". Does that mean I CAN wear the waistcoat to go with my neck-to-knee striped outfit, or maybe even the navy blue knitted article?

Also, I'm afraid (or maybe I should be glad) that La Belle France is just a teeny wee bit further than a ferry-ride away from me. Our nearest overseas neighbour would be across the bridge to Bribie Island... which will mean abso-bloody-lutely nothing to anyone without a detailed map of Queensland, and asking to get your moolies marinaded would just be asking for trouble over there.... They eat their young y'know.

Oh yes, by the way, I changed the name to protect the innocent as the membership form said there was already a macca on the lists.... Gawd help him.