"WW2 Soldiers loved to Sing-Provided they got..." Topic

…TO SING THEIR WAY

"SINGING has long been part of military life, and the U.S. Army wanted to keep this heritage alive as it mobilized and trained more than eight million soldiers to fight in Europe and the Pacific. The army believed that group singing was important for "morale building through soldier participation" and "emotional stability through self-entertainment," explained Captain M. Claude Rosenberry, who helped set up the army music program.

Wanting things done its way, the army adopted a regimented approach to music. In 1941, it published its official Army Song Book, containing 67 patriotic, folk, and service songs like "The Star-Spangled Banner," "America the Beautiful," and "Pop! Goes the Weasel," and it expected soldiers to learn all 67 songs. The Quartermaster Corps even wrapped pamphlets of religious tunes around rations to make sure wholesome material reached the front. The army organized officially sanctioned sing-alongs and envisioned every platoon with a barbershop quartet and a "camp-fire instrumentalist (guitar, ukulele, etc.)" and each company with a song leader and "accordionist," Captain Rosenberry wrote…"

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Armand

Yep!

(smile)

Armand

I actually do that with my wargame armies. Each battalion or even company gets a musician. Drummer, fife, bugle of course for the older time periods, but I also have guitar, accordion, violin, even a couple piano players. Troops with a musician get a morale bonus when their morale is threatened, just like for an officer, mascot, or chaplain.

Mike Bunkermeister Creek

The military, college sports and church are probably the last two places (outside of primary schools, and I don't know how much of it they do anymore) where you can still routinely experience communal song. It's one of the oldest social experiences, but it has largely vanished in our lifetime, thanks to modern recording and broadcasting. It used to be that every barroom and social venue had a piano, and people furnished all the music themselves. That has changed completely in little more than the span of a human lifetime.

It's interesting to see an old movie, and see scenes of people singing together, no matter how incongruous- think of the railway carriage scene from "In Which We Serve." Some of the older military songs were pretty hilariously vulgar, too- although they take some parsing, because the writers of the time had to discretely clean them up to meet publication standards. George Formby's most famous song did NOT start out as "Bless ‘em all!"

I'm reminded of Zulu, when the British respond to the Zulu's chanting by singing (Men of Harlech, I believe it was).

Or in Casablanca, when the Germans order the band to play some German song, and the crowd responds by bursting into the Marsellaise (sp?)

And then there came Karaoke… bring back Pianos! lol.

Ha!…

Armand

it is interesting how the type of army song changes betxeen the wars

ww1 jingoistic ( usually to musichall tunes) but also deeply run through with a jaundiced view of the war (usually to hymn or chapel tunes) usually obscene as well

ww2 much more romantic and based on popular tunes of the time.

the falklands war produced one which was based on the us tune The Battle of New Orleans.

to get an idea of ww1 look at the musical Oh What a Lovely War

for ww2 look on facebook for Sods Army but again it does err on the obscene.

Granda was taken to see 'Oh, What A Lovely War'… but got up and walked out on it.
He thought it was 'taking the P'.
Looking 'sideways'… not a Bad movie… but FAR too 'Artsy'.
Some songs 'haunt'.

Thanks!

Armand