Sidney's Place: YESTERDAY'S IDOLS: JOHN COUNT McCORMACK and SIR HARRY LAUDER

If I had asked my parents and grand-parents (great-grand-parents no doubt for many of my readers!) which songsters most appealed to them, two names would be sure to feature – John McCormack and Harry Lauder. Their heydays were in the first 40 years of the 20^th century and their appeal belonged to that age. Before memories fade, crowded out by the noisy hordes of modern pop idols, I celebrate these two great artistes.

John McCormack

John McCormack (1884-1945) was the archetypical Irish lyric tenor. Born of Scots parents in Athlone, Central Ireland, he was educated by the Marist brothers and later in Sligo, before winning a prestigious singing prize in Dublin where his voice was trained. In 1905 his friends had raised enough funds for John to take lessons and sing in Italy and he made his operatic debut there. He sang in the US, Australia with Nellie Melba and at Covent Garden but he was not a natural stage actor and by 1912 he was concentrating on concert performances and on making early gramophone recordings.

He recorded many operatic arias and his clear, light tenor voice and excellent breathing control were much admired. It is however as a singer of traditional and music-hall popular songs that he will be most remembered. The Minstrel Boy was one of hundreds and he was the first to record the immortal Great War marching song It’s a Long Way to Tipperary in 1914. In 1917 he gave us Keep the Home Fires Burning and earlier the equally sentimental Mother Machree:

Sure, I love the dear silver

That shines in your hair,

And the brow that's all furrowed,

And wrinkled with care.

I kiss the dear fingers,

So toil-worn for me,

Oh, God bless you and keep you,

Mother Machree.

In 1917, McCormack became an American citizen and lost audiences in Britain, but not in the US and Australia, by espousing the nationalist cause in Ireland pushing songs like The Wearing of the Green. His concerts were always a sell-out and he enjoyed Hollywood fame and riches in 1930 with the early musical Song o’ my Heart. De Valera’s Catholic Ireland was much to his taste and perhaps the highpoint of his career was his rendition of César Franck’s Panis Angelicus to a vast crowd at Phoenix Park, Dublin on the occasion of the Eucharistic Congress there in 1932. McCormack had a jovial personality and his charitable work was rewarded in 1928 by his appointment as a Papal Count, a title he used. An Irish hero, he died of emphysema in Dublin in 1945.

McCormack showed the way for many other Irish lyric tenors. I worked backstage in 1961 at our family-owned Capitol theatre, Aberdeen for its summer show. On the bill was a chunky Glasgow-Irish comedian called Glen Daly. His comic routine was droll and he made me laugh. But when he started to sing, he entered another higher dimension. I particularly recall Glen singing the lovely Burns song The Bonnie Lass of Ballochmyle:

Fair is the morn in flowery May,
And sweet is night in autumn mild,
When roving through the garden gay,
Or wandering in the lonely wild:	20
But woman, Nature’s darling child!
There all her charms she does compile;
Even there her other works are foiled
By the bonnie lass o’ Ballochmyle.

Glen possessed what my dear Mother always referred to as “a fine set of pipes”; he won some fame as the original performer of The Celtic Song of the famous football club and he was unmistakably an heir to the melodic tradition of John McCormack.

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Harry Lauder (1870 – 1950) was a more rough-hewn character. Born in Portobello, near Edinburgh the family moved to Arbroath where Harry worked part-time in a flax works so that he could continue to be educated up to the age of 15.They moved to Hamilton in Lanarkshire and Harry worked in the mines, but his song-writing and singing talents were noticed. He sang at local concerts and made a little money, soon being advised to join one of the many “concert parties” touring the British towns. He had a notable success in a Theatre Royal, Glasgow pantomime and he quickly became a well-known theatrical turn, soon adopting his trade mark dress kilt, sporran and absurd crooked stick.

Harry composed many of his own songs and his signature tune I love a Lassie was instantly recognisable.

I love a lassie, a bonnie, bonnie lassie
She's as pure as the lily in the dell
She's as sweet as the heather
The bonnie purple heather
Mary, ma Scotch bluebell.

His act usually comprised 3 of his famous songs, much comic patter and story–telling and an often sentimental monologue. He created a Scots stereotype, proud of his kilt, outwitting the city sophisticates, careful with his money, fond of a drink and jovially praising his native land. His comic songs were legion I’m the Saftest in the Family, Stop yer ticklin’ Jock and the old favourite Just a wee Deoch an’ Doris (Gaelic for “a drink at the door”)

Just a wee deoch an doris, just a wee drop, that's all.
Just a wee deoch an doris afore ye gang awa.
There's a wee wifie waitin' in a wee but an ben.
If you can say, "It's a braw bricht moonlicht nicht",
Then yer a'richt, ye ken.

By 1912 he was top of the bill at the very first Royal Command Performance given for George V and his tours of the US, Canada and Australia made him a rich man. During the First World War he tirelessly entertained the troops, being described by Churchill as “Scotland’s greatest ever Ambassador” – he was knighted for his services in 1919. His only son John was killed in action in December 1916 and Harry wrote one of his most famous songs as some kind of consolation: Keep Right on to the End of the Road;

Keep right on to the end of the road
Keep right on to the end
Tho' the way be long, let your heart be strong
Keep right on to the end
Tho’ you're tired and weary still journey on,
Till you come to your happy abode
Where all you love, you've been dreaming of
Will be there, at the end of the road.

After the War this song long resonated. My father recalled Harry Lauder coming to our family theatre His Majesty’s in Aberdeen in the 1930s. The packed audience contained many widows and bereaved mothers – rural Scotland had suffered disproportionate casualties. When this song was struck up, and it always was, there would be weeping and faintings in the highly emotional atmosphere, but all sang along. Harry retired in 1938 but still sang on the radio during WW2, dying at Strathaven near Hamilton in 1950.

As a schoolboy at my prep school in the early 1950s, we were played crackly 12in 78rpm records of Harry Lauder as a special treat. We loved the songs, though an earlier generation fully glowed and warmed to their sentiments. Nonetheless tuneful Harry Lauder remains a proud part of the Scottish heritage.

Roamin' in the gloamin' on the bonny banks o' Clyde
Roamin' in the gloamin' with my lassie by my side
When the sun has gone to rest
That's the time we love the best
Ach, it's lovely roamin' in the gloamin'