I guess it's passed out of pop culture now, so younger people may not know that for generations it was the text of a very popular song, with the first line as its title.
As soon as I saw the first line I began to sing it in my head. We had it in a collection called _The Fireside Book of Folk Songs_; I seem to remember this from my very youngest days, so my folks must have gotten it near when it was first published in the late 40s. I still have it today, though I have to be pretty careful with the pages now. It tells me that the origin of the tune is unknown and couldn't be traced before around 1770. It's so strange the things that stick with you over time -- it's not like this is a song I sing every day or even every decade, but it's clear as a bell in my head at the least mention.
I did know that, though I'm not sure I'd ever actually heard it. Of course that sent me down a rabbit hole, and now here's Johnny Cash singing it (with a preface about singing it at his high school's graduation, and a remark that it must be Elizabethan, because it sounds like the King James Bible --- which I found really affecting for some reason).
I noticed Johnny Cash on that Wikipedia list, and could immediately hear it in my mind, though I don't think I've ever actually heard it. I also can't explain why I know the tune very well through the first few lines of the song, though I can't imagine that I've heard it more than a few times in my life. I guess that's a tribute to the tune.
I think it was the sort of song that people used to gather round a piano and sing, back when people did that. My family did not. Or maybe it was drunks in bars?
Memory has it echoing from some very old movies, that once were free, and now are all belonging to Turner Classic Movies. Think maybe 1930's to maybe 1940's.
I keep wanting to say that it's a song one of Barbara Pym's curates sings at a parish fete, but maybe not. I know that "Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms" is one of those songs, and some Pym heroine or other wonders how anyone can bear to sing those songs now.
I guess it's passed out of pop culture now, so younger people may not know that for generations it was the text of a very popular song, with the first line as its title.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drink_to_Me_Only_with_Thine_Eyes
A striking number of performances listed there. I want to hear the one by Swans. Or maybe not.
As soon as I saw the first line I began to sing it in my head. We had it in a collection called _The Fireside Book of Folk Songs_; I seem to remember this from my very youngest days, so my folks must have gotten it near when it was first published in the late 40s. I still have it today, though I have to be pretty careful with the pages now. It tells me that the origin of the tune is unknown and couldn't be traced before around 1770. It's so strange the things that stick with you over time -- it's not like this is a song I sing every day or even every decade, but it's clear as a bell in my head at the least mention.
Same here. I can't imagine that I've heard it more than a few times spread over decades. Yet there it is in my head.
I did know that, though I'm not sure I'd ever actually heard it. Of course that sent me down a rabbit hole, and now here's Johnny Cash singing it (with a preface about singing it at his high school's graduation, and a remark that it must be Elizabethan, because it sounds like the King James Bible --- which I found really affecting for some reason).
Would have been clever of me to include the link I meant to include in that reply nine hours ago. https://youtu.be/0LJeidEMdXA?si=OtA93qkV0bqowiZP
I noticed Johnny Cash on that Wikipedia list, and could immediately hear it in my mind, though I don't think I've ever actually heard it. I also can't explain why I know the tune very well through the first few lines of the song, though I can't imagine that I've heard it more than a few times in my life. I guess that's a tribute to the tune.
I think it was the sort of song that people used to gather round a piano and sing, back when people did that. My family did not. Or maybe it was drunks in bars?
Memory has it echoing from some very old movies, that once were free, and now are all belonging to Turner Classic Movies. Think maybe 1930's to maybe 1940's.
I keep wanting to say that it's a song one of Barbara Pym's curates sings at a parish fete, but maybe not. I know that "Believe Me, If All Those Endearing Young Charms" is one of those songs, and some Pym heroine or other wonders how anyone can bear to sing those songs now.
That one sounds in my head, too.