Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 28 Jun 11 - 10:22 PM

YouTube has recordings of LILY OF LAGUNA by:
G. H. Elliott
Jimmy Carlton (1930s)
Eugene Stratton (1911)
Stanley Holloway (Date not given, but probably late in his career. He sings only the chorus.)

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST,Jeanette Alexander
Date: 27 Jun 11 - 05:05 PM

I have the wors and music for Lily of Laguna in a book "Sixty Old Time Variety Songs, which I bought for 10/- (ten old shillings to the youngsters) at Francis, Day & Hunter Ltd in Charing Cross Road WC2 back in the early 50's. It's a super book - much battered and taped now, but I wouldn't part with it for all the tea in China.
We made excellent use of it in the British Amateur Theatre Society in Stavanger (Norway) when I lived there, especially when we introduced the local and ex-pat community to Old Time Music Hall and I never tire of wathcing our efforts on a rather (now) fuzzy video recording.
I love it! Sadly, "they don't write 'em like that any more".

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Oct 10 - 07:35 AM

Contact the carlton football club in Australia if u have sheet music to Lily..., they really ant it.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST,Tunesmith
Date: 04 Jul 10 - 07:54 AM

There was a British film starring Robert Morley made about Leslie Stuart but I don't recall it being on Tv for ages.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST,Ken
Date: 03 Jul 10 - 08:12 PM

I have the sheet music of The Lily of Laguna by Leslie Stuart, does anyone know what it may be worth?

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 16 Jun 10 - 09:44 PM

There's a famous old Decca recording of this as a duet sung by Bing Crosby & Mary Martin, from about 1938. You can probably hear it on YouTube. I believe they first sang it in a Paramount Pictures film.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: Joe_F
Date: 16 Jun 10 - 08:34 PM

I have it sung by Andy Barrand on an LP (An Evening At The English Music Hall, FHR-030). She has gotten rid of the coon stuff (unless you count "black sheep", which IMO you shouldn't).

A triple paradise: (1) someone likes you, (2) she or he says so, (3) you believe it!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Jun 10 - 07:25 AM

Thank you sorry it took so long i had lost the site , Tony

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: The Lily of Laguna (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Jun 10 - 07:19 AM

Yes, now that is what I recall I was told by my grandmother (Jesse Amelia Elliott (trapeze)). She told me G H Elliot (the chocolate coloured coon), Lil Elliot and Marie Lloyd and the Great Goulberts were all related to her thus myself also. The Gaitey Theatre, The London Palladium and the Midsummers nights dream were all mentioned wherein my grandfather (her husband) was the props master who also made all the false heads for the show. His name was Richard Wood who also was the goal keeper for Clapton Orient before they became the Leyton O's. There is a Bill Elliot my grandmother's brother whom I met who also had a son Jock Elliot who I also met in the 60's who played every musical instrument. Tony

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: GUEST,Denis from Stoneycroft
Date: 30 Sep 09 - 10:55 AM

There used to be a music hall artist many years ago by the name of G.H.Elliot. His tag line was "The Chocolate Coloured Coon" - imagine anyone trying to use that these days! You can read about him at http://www.localhistory.scit.wlv.ac.uk/articles/hippodrome/entertainers3.htm

I can remember seeing him in a show made up of old-timers back in the 1940s, or it might have been the early '50s. There were other characters such as Randolph Sutton, Nellie Wallace, Ella Shields, and Marie Lloyd Jnr. It was a touring show called Thanks For The Memory - a little bit like the touring shows of old rock'n'roll stars that go round today.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Willa
Date: 22 Jul 08 - 04:52 PM

Guest Anthony
try here
http://www.therecordmine.com/cd_image/g_h_elliott_notes.htm

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Acorn4
Date: 22 Jul 08 - 08:03 AM

I actually have rather unfortunate memories of this song.

I had a rather large aunt who fancied herself as a bit of a diva, and used to perform this at the local Women's Institute review to which I was dragged along. She would appear with a large plumed feather type of structure on top of her head, accompanied by an out of tune piano.

At the climactic moement of the chorus she would approach the top note by the "safety first" method of starting from the lower note and swooping up to it , knowing that she would inevtitably reach the right pitch in the end.

Put me off Music Hall for a bit!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Brakn
Date: 22 Jul 08 - 07:48 AM

BTW
Thomas Augustine Barrett was born in Southport of Irish parents and lived at 14 Lime Grove, Chorlton Upon Medlock, Manchester in 1891. By 1901 he had changed his name to Leslie Stuart and had moved to London.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Jul 08 - 04:22 AM

My great-grandad (paternal grandfathers father) sang this while having his arm cut off following an accident down the coal mine! Nothing to do with the song of course but adds a bit of colour:-) He went on to teach boxing at the youth club in Pendlebury that eventualy because home to the Russian Orthodox church that my paternal grandfather held services at. Serendipity or what? I never knew it was a black-face song. Sort of makes it more apt for singing down the coal mine I suppose!

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Mr Happy
Date: 21 Jul 08 - 05:36 AM

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=ApPFxgvrY5c

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: GUEST,E-elemental
Date: 21 Jul 08 - 03:42 AM

In the chorus, it's not "She's the only girl Laguna knows." Laguna might know more girls than that. It's "She's the only queen Laguna knows." Cheers!

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: GUEST,Anthony Fatt
Date: 17 Jul 08 - 04:02 AM

Please excuse me but I was just browsing through. My grandmother's maiden name was Elliot of the Theatrical Elliots. She when alive used to talk about Lil Elliott (whom I met twice as a young man; she lived in Oxford), The Great Gilberts? (Goulberts) who performed at the Gaitey Theatre etc. and also a relative whose stage name was the "Chocolate Coloured Coon", who she said was an Elliot. Can anyone link the family names for me with some history? Thank you. Tony.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Flash Company
Date: 05 Apr 08 - 10:37 AM

I remember it as:-

Shes my lady love,
She is my queen, my baby love....

Otherwise much the same.

Saw G H Elliot just after WW11, already a very old man but a beautiful voice. Vesta Tilley and (I think) Albert Whelan were on the same bill.

FC

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 05 Apr 08 - 06:29 AM

You can see the sheet music of THE LILY OF LAGUNA at the National Library of Australia web site.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: GUEST,Jim Ward
Date: 07 May 03 - 09:25 PM

I got it from the Francis, Day & Hunter sheet music Charley, and the chorus is also identical to yours.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Charley Noble
Date: 07 May 03 - 02:27 PM

For consistency sake, Jim Dixon, consider copying the chorus that I posted above and replacing what Jim Ward probably copied from your orignal posting.

Thanks, Jim Ward, for pasting the other two verses which I wasn't looking forward to typing! Were you also using The British Music Hall as your source? The verses look identical.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: An Pluiméir Ceolmhar
Date: 07 May 03 - 12:50 PM

I'm beginning to see why we don't hear that song much these days!

Subject: Lyr Add: THE LILY OF LAGUNA (Leslie Stuart)
From: GUEST,Jim Ward
Date: 07 May 03 - 11:24 AM

THE LILY OF LAGUNA
Written and composed by Leslie Stuart in 1898 for the great American music hall singer, Eugene Stratton (The Dandy Coloured Coon). G. H. Elliott (The Chocolate Coloured Coon) revived many of Stratton's songs after his death in 1918 and continued performing them until his death in 1962.

1. It's de same old tale of a palpatating niggar ev'ry time, ev'ry time;
It's de same old trouble of a coon
Dat wants to be married very soon;
It's de same old heart dat is longing for its lady ev'ry time, yes ev'ry time,
But not de same gal, not de same gal,
She is ma Lily, ma Lily, ma Lily gal!
She goes ev'ry sundown, yes, ev'ry sundown
Callin' in de cattle up de mountain;
I go 'kase she wants me, yes, 'kase she wants me
Help her do de callin' and de countin'.
She plays her music to call de lone lambs dat roam above,
But I'm de black sheep and I'm waitin'
For de signal of ma little lady love.

CHORUS: She's ma lady love.
She is ma dove, my baby love.
She's no gal for sittin' down to dream.
She's de only queen Laguna knows.
I know she likes me.
I know she likes me
Bekase she says so.
She is de Lily of Laguna.
She is my Lily and ma Rose.

2. When I first met Lil it was down in old Laguna at de dance, oder night;
So she says, "Say, a'm curious for to know
When ye leave here de way yer goin' to go,
'Kase a wants to see who de lady is dat claims ye all way home, way home tonight."
I says, "I've no gal, never had one,"
And den ma Lily, ma Lily, ma Lily gal!
She says, "Kern't believe ye, a kern't believe ye,
Else I'd like to have ye shapperoon me;
Dad says he'll esscortch me, says he'll esscortch me,
But it's mighty easy for to lose him."
Since then each sundown I wander down here and roam around
Until I know ma lady wants me,
Till I hear de music ob de signal sound.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Charley Noble
Date: 07 May 03 - 08:45 AM

As Masato mentioned, this one is included in Songs of the British Music Hall,Oak Pub., 1971. The lyrics and music are there along with extensive notes by the editor Petyer Davison. The chorus is more in dialect:

She's ma lady love, She is ma dove, ma baby love,
She's no gal for sittin' down to dream,
She's de only queen Laguna knows;
I know she likes me,
I know she likes me,
Bekase she says so;
She is de Lily of Laguna, she is ma Lily and ma Rose.

I haven't the time this morning to type out the other two long verses but I promise to do so if you really need them or if some other thoughtful soul doesn't post them.

Davison does attempt to put in context the use of "coon" and "nigger" in this song.

Charley Noble

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: GUEST,Jim Ward
Date: 07 May 03 - 06:25 AM

Also in the fairly easily found 'Sixty Old Time Variety Songs'(Francis, Day & Hunter). I havn't got time to put the words in at the moment but will later if nobody else does.

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Compton
Date: 07 May 03 - 05:13 AM

Sung in the far of days of Music hall and Variety "with much success by G.H.Elliot- The Chocolate Coloured Coon. A very good version is on a Cosmotheka LP by the late Al Sealey

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 07 May 03 - 03:37 AM

That's the chorus, Jim: do you have the verses?

Steve

Subject: RE: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: masato sakurai
Date: 07 May 03 - 02:00 AM

According to Plymouth Song Index, "Lily of Laguna" is contained these books:

All-time hits, 250, arr. all keyboards, vol.4 (s   1993       Score
Bumper book of pub favourites, ed. p. foss (song   1988       Songbook
Great songs of the 20th century, 1900-1950         1999       Songbook
Boomps-a-daisy: 40 singable songs                  1986       Songbook
Eastenders sing-along: all keyboards               1985       Songbook
1910s, music for the millennium                   1997       Songbook
Boiled beef and carrots (songbook)                1987       Songbook
It's easy to play Music Hall                                  Songbook
Bumper book of music hall songs, ed. p. foss       1988       Songbook
Ulverscroft large print song book, music edition   1981       Songbook
101 pub favourites for buskers, piano/organ/guit   1986       Songbook
Songs of the British music hall                   1971       Songbook
Illustrated Victorian songbook                               Songbook

~Masato

Subject: Lyr Add: Lily of Laguna
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 07 May 03 - 01:36 AM

This old music hall song has been mentioned in a few other threads, but none of them seemed a good place to post the lyrics:

Lyrics copied from http://ingeb.org/songs/shesmyla.html

LILY OF LAGUNA
Thomas Augustine Barrett ('Leslie Stuart') [who was English]
1898
Written for the American blackface minstrel Eugene Stratton.

She's my ladylove.
She is my dove, my baby love.
She's no girl for sitting down to dream.
She's the only girl Laguna knows.
I know she likes me.
I know she likes me
Because she said so.
She is my Lily of Laguna.
She is my lily and my rose.

[You can see the sheet music cover near the bottom of this page:
http://www.gabrielleray.150m.com/ArchiveTextPQ/PeggyGaiety1911.html.

I suspect what we have above is just the chorus of a longer song.