John McCormack

Irish Mike writes:

On Sunday, November 27, 1938, the great Irish tenor, John McCormack, gave his farewell concert at Royal Albert Hall in London. Thus ended a truly remarkable career that spanned nearly four decades. More than 11,000 people filled the vast hall as hundreds outside were turned away. Although he was not the singer that he was in his prime 20 years earlier, by all accounts of the event, John McCormack gave an astonishing performance. It was noted that, including encores, he sang an incredible 27 songs and did not leave a dry eye in the house.

There are some commenters that one does wonder about:

Is it live ? Appears to be old recordings and canned clapping but photos and articles are excellent.  I also recall a London concert after his illness and during the Anglo-Irish war c. 1921 when he had great reservations he'd be booed but he wasn't.

Irish Mike replied:

Hi, Nigel! No, the concert is just a facsimile of what I thought it may have happened. I used recordings of the available songs listed on the program and plugged in the applause. Unfortunately, nobody had the foresight to record the performance at the time. Such a pity! Thank you for your kind remarks!

 

He did go back to London after WW1....October, 1924 and gave his first concert there since 1914. He was afraid his British audience would not forgive him from becoming an American citizen in 1918/19. His fears were unfounded!

So listeners, please understand it for what it is - there was no recording, either by EMI or the BBC - I think the reasons are clear as to why.  I'd be interested to know what my father thought - he liked the tenors and baritones, Richard Tauber his favourite - just because I can't remember, does not mean he did not like John McCormack, though there were political reasons of course.

Herewith the songs of the concert itself, not necessarily as they appear in the YT:

• Minnelied
• Where'er You Walk
• Herr, was tragt der Boden hier
• Auch kieine Dinge
• Panis Angelicus
• The Star of the County Down
• O Mary Dear
• The Old House
• A Cradle Song
• When I Have Sung My Songs

Encores:

• A Fairy Story by the Fire
• By the Short Cut to the Rosses
• The Rose of Tralee
• Just For Today
• Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms

Sometimes it's not right to embed a chap's work he's put in and I'm feeling this now about Irish Mike' video.  I'd appreciate it if you could click on the youtube notice and at least go there to read the detail and give him visitors.

Just some reflections about parents, generations and music

If you accept that this music is two generations ahead of me - parents are one and a half to two generations before, then it's easy enough to access the music of someone born around 1940 and not so hard to access the music of someone born 1965 or thereabouts - they're the generations either side of mine.

There were eight years between my parents so they themselves would have had different eras of songs.  My mother was definitely for 50s musicals, my father had tastes more like this above. He also had this worrying penchant for Scottish ditties, not so much the Irish.  And they both kept going to the Edinburgh Tattoo.

I'd have enormous difficulty saying what was my 'era' for popular music because it wasn't the one where I was.  20s, 50s, late 70s, early 90s.