Old School songs and did they affect you in any way?

[Deathraystare]

For some reason the same bloody song from school keeps going around in my head. I hated it! Basically it quite angers me! Yes I suppose that sounds hard but it must have stirred some early feminist feelings.

Basically it went "Oh Soldier, Soldier won't you marry me with your musket, fife and drum?" "Oh no sweet maid I cannot marry you for I have no xxx of my own" "So off she goes to her Grandfather's chest and gets him a xxx of the very, very best and the Soldier puts them on".

Of course at the very end after the bastard has sponged off her he tells her he cannot marry her as he has a wife of his own. Everyone else thought this was funny. I did not, I thought it was terrible!

Another song was about "Go and tell Aunt Nancy the old grey goose is dead" this upset me cos I was (still am) soft over animals.

And Molly Malone

So many of these lyrics bring back primary school memories… the little blue Come and Praise hymn book!

I hated singing so joined the school orchestra. We played at the front of the hall on hymn practice day, which was a Wednesday morning I think.

Lord of the Dance was one of my favourites, and Give me oil in my lamp because someone would always forget which line we were on and add in a ‘of Kings’. That always amused me.

@Ducksurprise Goodbye Dolly Grey?
Goodbye Dolly I must leave you
Though it breaks my heart to go...

I used to sob at the thought of leaving my dolly when some old chap sang it on The Good Old Days...I think my mum used to think it was very sweet.

‘The Trout’ by Schubert. I knew the song very well - or so I thought - because my dad used to do classical singing and often sang this at home - but crucially only the first two verses. Then one day we sang it in a music lesson at secondary school and I discovered there’s a third verse which goes into a minor key because they catch the fish and it dies. I went home in tears and angrily blamed my dad for misleading me!

In a similar vein, ‘The Ash Grove’ (another of my dad’s standards, but at least I knew what was coming this time). ‘Ye echoes o tell me, where is that sweet maiden / She sleeps ‘neath the green turf down by the ash grove’.

There was also a particularly stirring hymn which we used to sing only on Commemoration Day at the end of the school year. I think it’s called ‘Christ is made the sure foundation’ and I’m not honestly sure why it used to get to me - just something about the chords I guess, but the final line went something like ‘while unending ages run’ and for some reason it always left me choked up.

I have blocked out Puff the Magic Dragon.

@ChesapeakeEmbarrassed

My grandfathers clock gives me PTSD. I can't even think about that horrific line, you know the one, without getting teary.

There was an old lady who swallowed a fly... horse... dead of course. is also not very pleasant.

None of these are as bad as those Grimms fairy tales that often end with someone being punished for which read killed by being sealed into a barrell lined with nails and rolled down a hill.

My kids got very upset about the old lady who swallowed a fly. We end it with "she puked, of course!"

Much less traumatic.

We used to sing the soldier soldier song at Brownies. And another one about a cowboy falling off his horse and cracking his head. At infant school we sand one about going to visit some cabbages.

I'm now sitting sobbing gently on the sofa. I've managed not to think about Puff properly in years and now it's all back in my head! Awful. Really awful.

Molly Malone never bothered me, I don't know why. The Streets of London made half our class cry in assembly though.

We mainly did upbeat songs. I distinctly recall one about a muck spreader, but parental complaints stopped that one! And The Wurzels "I've Got A Brand New Combine Harvester" was very popular at harvest festival! And a lot of old pop songs. Bob Dylan protest type songs.

@ChrissyPlummer I'm the same with Puff the magic dragon. Can't bear it!

I went to a CofE primary xwschool and remembered a song we used to sing in assembly only last week:

As I was a-walking one morning in Spring
I met with some travellers on an old country lane
One was an old man, the second; a maid, and one was a young boy who smiled as he said:
"With the wind in the willows, and the birds in the sky,
and the bright sun to warm us wherever we lie. We have bread and fishes, and a jug of red wine to share on our journey with all of mankind."
I asked them to tell me their name and their place
So that I could remember their kindness and grace.
One was an old man, the second; a maid, and one was a young boy who smiled as he said...".

I cried when I remembered this song, aching for that childhood innocence when your neighbours were your friends and it didn't matter what colour a person's skin was, and strangers were mostly kind people, and so-on.

We once sang a Graham Kendrick hymn called Led like a lamb to
The slaughter. That upset me at the time. But i like it as an adult as the last two verses are lovely.

Came to say Puff the magic dragon but seems I'm not the only one! Still can't listen!
Streets of London too

Bread and fishes is one of my all time favourite songs. It's supposed to be a legend about The Holy family visiting Glastonbury.

"We're travelling to Glaston, through England's green lanes.
To hear if men's troubles, to hear of men's pains.
My name it is Joseph, this is Mary my wife, and this is our young son who is our dear life.

When a knight won his spurs

@Toddlerteaplease yep, that's the one.

[quote Branleuse]When a knight won his spurs

Not a school song, but I didn't like that poor old Mother Hubbard's dog got no bone.

I was a music teacher in an Essex junior school and led a hymn practice every week for years. "Autumns Days" holds fond memories for me!

"To say a great big Fankyou I mustn't forget!" ( never did get them to pronounce the TH properly in the 25 years I was there!) I always used to let them shout on the bit about "a win for my home team! " too!

'Tow row row
Toldyridy toldyridy
Tow row row'

Oh and yes I used to love "Bread and fishes!" One of my favourites!

@Branleuse I had this at my wedding. The vicar thought it was a crazy choice but I think it's a good wedding song, and loved it at school

[quote Branleuse]When a knight won his spurs

@Ducksurprise

And Molly Malone

I came on to say this one.

“She died of a fever, and no one could save her, and that was the end of poor Molly Malone. But her ghost wheels her barrow, through streets broad and narrow, crying cockles and muscles alive alive-o”

Anyone sing
Jesus love is very wonderful x3
Oh! Wonderful love.
So high, you can't get over it
So low, you can't get under it" etc

Anyway, my kids sing Big Red Combine Harvester, which from what I can make out from their not so tuneful versions, sounds like a minor key version.

Bright Eyes was obviously very disturbing with the Watership Down traumatic reference.
Two Little Boys used to make me tear up, then we realised what Rolf Harris was really all about.