Songs about birthdays and/or age

Subject: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From:
Date: 09 Dec 98 - 06:58 PM

I'm interested in song titles or subjects written regarding birthdays and/or specific ages (eg "When I'm 64"). Any help of where to look or your own information would be helpful.

Thanks.

Dave Dempster

Subject: Lyr Add: ON BOARD A NINETY-EIGHT^^
From: Barry Finn
Date: 09 Dec 98 - 10:04 PM

Do a search of the DT using @age you'll come up with a bunch. One of my favorites (not yet in the DT) is a song that Peter Bellamy wrote a new tune for. Taken from Dan Milner's "Bonnie Bunch Of Roses".

ON BOARD A NINETY-EIGHT

When I was young & scarce 18, I drove a roaring trade
And many a sly trick I have played with many a pretty maid
My parents found that would not do, I soon should spend their store
So they resolved that I should go on board a man-of-war

A bold press gang surrounded me, their warrant they did show
And swore that I should go to sea & face the daring foe
So off they lugged me to the boat, O how I cursed my fate
'Twas then I found that I must float on board a 98

When I put my foot on board, how I began to stare
Our Admiral, he gave the word, there is no time to spare
They weighed the anchor, shook our sail, & off they bore me straight
To watch the foe in storm & gale on board a 98

Before we reached America, they gave me many a drill
They soon learnt me a nimble way to handle an iron pill
In course of time a fight begun, when bold Jack Tars laid straight
What I would give if I could run from on board a 98

But as time flew I bolder grew & hardened was to war
I'd run aloft with my ship's crew & valued not a scar
So well I did my duty do, till I got Boatswain's mate
And damn me soon, got boatswain too on board a 98

So years rolled by at Trafalgar, brave Nelson fought & fell
As they capsized that hardy tar I caught a rap as well
To Greenwich College I came back because I saved my pate
They only knocked one wing off Jack, on board a 98

So now my cocoa I can take, my pouch with 'bacco stored
With my blue cloths & 3 cooked hat, I am as happy as a Lord
I've done my duty, served my King, & now I bless my fate
But damn me, I'm too old to sing, I'm nearly 98

This is on "Peter Bellamy, Tell It Like It Was", trailer records LER 2089. Peter sings this very upbeat on the LP but never as wildly as did in person. Collected by Vaughan Williams. Barry

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From: SteveF
Date: 10 Dec 98 - 08:07 AM

Let's start it off with Sinatra's "It was a Very Good Year."

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From: Pete Peterson
Date: 10 Dec 98 - 11:17 AM

Tina Liza Jones' BIRTHDAY CAKE (which is in Rise Up Singing) is a very good Birthday song-- specific ages mentioned in the song are 7, 22, and 92. Available recordings I know of are John Mc Cutcheon's and the Small Wonder String Band. PETE

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From:
Date: 10 Dec 98 - 03:38 PM

How 'bout the "unbirthday song" from Alice in Wonderland?

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From:
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 08:57 AM

'Run the Film Backwards' by Sydney Carter, which starts off
At the grand old age of eighty-seven they took me from my coffin ...
Haven't got the rest of the words just now, and it's not in the DT (not under this title, at any rate), so I'll try to bring it in next week. - Susanne

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From: Pete Peterson
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 09:23 AM

the Sydney Carter song sounds like he set F. Scott Fitzgerald's short story-- "The Strange Case of Benjamin Button" to music. . . its a small world after all. Pete

Subject: Lyr Add: SILVER IN THE STUBBLE (Sydney Carter)^^^
From: Bill Sullivan
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 09:31 AM

One of my favourites but it hurts a little to sing it these days. It's in the Database. Just type 'STUBBLE'.


SILVER IN THE STUBBLE
(Sydney Carter)

(ACBG) Am G Am / Am G Am / Am G Am G Am G / Am G Am

1. Early in the Morning, Hear the razor roar,
There's silver in the stubble And it wasn't there before.

CHORUS For the leaves are getting greener, And spring is on the way;
Girls are getting prettier And younger every day.

2. Silver in the stubble; Winter in the wood.
Fare you well, you wicked world, I'm going to be good.

3. Time to think of Heaven; Time to think of Hell.
Time to go to church on Sunday, Hark, I hear the bell.

4. But if any girl is willing, She only has to say;
I'll hang my halo on a shelf Until another day.


Note: The song is a bit short and a friend of mine wrote an additional verse which fits beautifully. If anyone's interested I will dig it out.

Bill

Subject: Lyr Add: RUN THE FILM BACKWARDS (Sydney Carter)^^
From:
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 09:50 AM

Found the words after all:

At the grand old age of eighty-seven they took me from my coffin
They gave me a flannel nightshirt that I could travel off in
Toothless, old and wrinkled I lay there on my bed
And slowly I forgot about the time when I'd been dead

The day when I was sixty-five ended my enjoyment
I had to put on working clothes and go to my employment
Then when I was sixty I found I had a wife
That explained the children - I had wondered all my life

I kept on growing younger, growing healthier and stronger
Till at the age of twenty-one I had a wife no longer
Found myself with younger girls rolling in the clover
Till one sad day I woke to find those happy times were over

Playing football after school and sausages a-cooking
Puffing on a cigarette when the teacher wasn't looking
The trees are getting taller now, the streets are getting wider
Mother means the world to me, soon I'll be inside her

Now in here it's very dark, nothing can I see
I hear the first beats of my heart, I wonder who I'll be

(Words Sydney Carter; tune Grandfather's Clock)

No idea if this is the same story as Scott Fitzgerald's, as I don't know that one. - Susanne

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From: Bill Sullivan
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 09:58 AM

Sydney Carter wrote both songs......

It seems age is an incurable disease Sydney.

(Hope Sidney Carter is still around)

Bill

Subject: RE: Songs about birthdays and/or age
From:
Date: 13 Dec 98 - 08:51 PM

Sounds like Martin Amies's "Time's Arrow", where the man's life is written backwards. That's a book, BTW, not a song.

How about that song -- is it called Dirty Old Man? "I've been around for eighty summers, etc"

"Now I'm Sixty Four", known in Newfoundland and not related to the song by the Beatles. I don't know its history but it has a Victorian feel to it.

I suppose "When This Old Hat Was New". The old man doesn't mention his exact age but mentions things that happened "four score years ago" in the time of Queen Elizabeth I. Since he was a young working man at the time of these events he must have been singing his lament at a great age indeed, and amazingly the same hat seems to have lasted him all those years. Actually this song might qualify for the "dirge" thread.