Open Writing

Nope – not talking about me singing “Minnie the Moocher” and getting the audience to respond to the “Hi-de-hi” bits, as sung by Cab Calloway. (Not that I would. One has to draw the line somewhere.) No, I was thinking of a radio programme of that name, inflicted on us at primary school during the Sixties.

Every week, we’d all sat cross-legged in the assembly hall, waiting for the booming tones of the announcer – “Singing Together!”. Odd how the memory plays tricks. I had recalled this man as another toffee-nosed BBC presenter, talking down to the “chul-drun”. Not so. He was a Yorkshireman. Talking down to us in a Yorkshire accent, I suppose.

By and large, we seemed to get mouldy old folk songs to sing – the kind old Cecil Sharp probably didn’t bother with. I have a mental image of him, accosting yet another grizzled old salt or ploughman and bidding him strike up with his party piece. “Next!” he’d cry, as the song failed to pass muster.

We got the rejects.

A lot of them seemed to be about young girls, dressing up as boys so they could have something approaching a life. Can’t say I blame them – sitting on a cushion and sewing a fine seam have little appeal for me. Mind you, shinning up the rigging of HMS Victory wouldn’t have been my cup of tea either, as I can’t stand heights.

However, back to my crumbling primary school somewhere not a million miles from Rochester. We were pretty street-wise kids, although it wasn’t called that then. Dirty-minded little brats was more often heard. So when old Miss Best handed out the shiny new songbooks, we were eager to find something to snigger at. Oh joy! One day we were given the following to learn:

“As sweet Polly Oliver lay musing in bed
A sudden strange fancy came into her head…..”

Ooer Matron! She was contemplating running away to sea, of course, but we were giggling and snorting with glee. One kid stuffed his hanky in his mouth to try and stifle the noise. I hope it was clean. Bestie glared round, and we began to try and learn this pile of pig-poo. When you consider that this was circa 1963 – the Beatles were beginning to carry all before them - simple, vibrant pop songs with great harmonies , and little jazz-singer-in-the-making old me was listening to greats by the likes of Johnny Mercer and Cole Porter – it really didn’t do, did it?

(Before all you folkies begin baying for my blood – I like all good music and that includes good folk music. Not this lot, though.)

Sometimes we did get songs I liked. One of my first musical memories is listening to Paul Robeson on the radio – instant adoration. So when we had to learn “Oh Shenandoah”, no learning was involved for me. Not so the other kids, and our Pat, the one-boy tornado, reckoned he could improve on the lyric:

“Oh Shenandoah, I long to hear you...”

It’s not rocket science to work out what he sang, is it? Amazing how one small expletive carried over the massed voices of us good kids, singing the correct and non-profane word. Yet another mental image coming up – it was as if the word were written on a party balloon, Pat had let go of its string and it was bobbing away, over our heads at ceiling height.

Old Best waved us to silence. “Who was it?” she bawled. “Who was singing FILTH?” The stony silence was broken by one of the Goody Two Shoes Mafia, who put up her hand and snitched on Pat. The old bat hauled him off to her office for a damned good whacking. We got the Mafiosa in the playground at break. Something involving tying her pigtails to the playground fence, as I recall.

And was Pat downhearted? Not so’s you’d notice. A few weeks later we got a song that purported to be from “Under Milk Wood”. Somehow I don’t think Stan Tracy wrote the music, because to describe it as banal doesn’t actually reach first base. The first line was “Johnny Crack and Flossie Snail, kept their baby in a milking pail.” According to Pat, they were busily creating said baby in the pail. A little cramped for that kind of activity, I would have thought. Later in the song we were told that all it had to drink was ale and stout. Lucky old baby. These days, of course the government are contemplating making the giving of alcohol to kids under fifteen a criminal offence. I am getting quite a bit of fun out of the idea of Dylan Thomas being hauled off to the pokey for corrupting the country’s youth.

We had another young berserker in the making – one Ned. Fiendishly clever with it, was Ned and a particular pal of mine. He reckoned he could improve on a song called “John Cherokee”. The first line (all I can remember) was:

“Oh this is the tale of John Cherokee – Alabama John Cherokee...”

Ned’s version (much more fun) was “Oh this is the tale of John Cheddar-Cheese – what a bummer, his feet stink of cheese!” Got away with it, too – but then, he would.

So you could say that for us, “Singing Together” was a bit of a failure. How come, you might ask, do I still remember the songs so well, if that’s the case? Well, it’s the downside of a musical memory like a sponge – something very useful to me as a jazz singer but which has led to me having a head full of rubbish as well as the decent stuff. The rubbish includes ancient ads for products whose shelf life has long passed – I reckon I could write another article about that alone but I’m not that cruel. Can’t resist leaving you with one though…..

“Crush it – and it just springs back
Wash it – and the colour stays fast
Give it the treatment – the family treatment
Encalon was built to last
For years and years and years and years and…
This is luxury you can afford – by CYRIL LORD!”

I wonder what happened to him?