Flanders and Swann - Songs of Flanders and Swann

Songs of Flanders and Swann

Flanders and Swann's songs are characterised by wit, gentle satire, complex rhyming schemes, and memorable choruses. Flanders commented during the recorded performance of At the Drop of Another Hat,

They wrote over a hundred comic songs together. The following selection gives an indication of their range.

• "All Gall"—a political satire based on the long career of Charles de Gaulle. At the time of writing, de Gaulle had recently vetoed the UK's first application to join the European Economic Community. Sung to the tune of "This Old Man."
• "Bedstead Men," a wry explanation for the rusty bedsteads dumped in ponds and lakes in the UK.
• "First and Second Law"—a jazzy setting of the first and second laws of thermodynamics.
• "The Gasman Cometh"—a verse-and-chorus song in which a householder finds that no tradesman ever completes a job without creating another, related job for another tradesman.
• "The Hippopotamus"—one of Flanders and Swann's best known songs (because of its memorable chorus, "Mud, mud, glorious mud"), and one of a range of songs that they wrote about different beasts, including
  • "The Gnu",
  • "The Rhinoceros",
  • "The Warthog" (both with the message that beauty is only skin deep) and
  • "The Armadillo".

It is among those Ian Wallace included in his repertoire.

• "Ill Wind"—Flanders's words sung to a slightly cut version, with cadenza, of the rondo finale of Mozart's Horn Concerto No. 4 in E flat major, K. 495. It has to be sung since Flanders's French horn was apparently stolen.
• "In The Desert" ("Верблюды", lit. "camels")—a "traditional Russian" song, performed by Donald Swann. He provides an English-language translation after every line. The song is extremely repetitive, rendering the translation largely redundant.
• "In the D'Oyly Cart"—a satire about the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. It was first performed in the revue Oranges and Lemons (1948) and revived in Penny Plain (1951). It was included as the first track on Flanders and Swann's 1974 album, And Then We Wrote.
• "Have Some Madeira M'Dear"—an old roué sings to an ingénue about the merits of that wine, hinting that he has seduction in mind, with complex word-play, including three oft-quoted examples of syllepsis.
• "Misalliance"—a political allegory concerning a love affair between a honeysuckle and a bindweed.
• "P** P* B**** B** D******" or "Pee Po Belly Bum Drawers"—a song comparing the use of profanity among the intelligentsia to playground swearing.
• "The Reluctant Cannibal"—an argument between father and son, on the topic of cannibalism (Son: "Eating people is wrong", Father: "Must have been someone he ate"—"he used to be a regular anthropophaguy") The father says you might as well say "Don't fight people" and they agree: "Ridiculous!". (Swann had registered as a conscientious objector during World War II and served with the Friends' Ambulance Unit.)
• "Slow Train"—a nostalgic song about the railway stations on lines scheduled for closure by the Beeching Axe in 1963.
• "A Song of Patriotic Prejudice"—a Little Englander's song ("The English, the English, the English are best,/ I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest")
• "A Song of Reproduction"—about the then topical mania for do-it-yourself hi-fi as an end in itself. (Making much of the jargon of the hobby - "woofer" "tweeter" "wow on your top" "flutter on your bottom" and in a line added for the stereo remake: "Raise the ceiling four feet, move the fireplace from that wall to that wall, you'll still only get the stereophonic effect if you sit in the bottom of that cupboard.")
• "A Song of the Weather"—a parody of the 1834 poem "January Brings the Snow" by Sara Coleridge
• "To Kokoraki" (Το Κοκοράκι, lit. "The Cockerel")—a modern-Greek children's song, something like "Old McDonald Had a Farm", in which a different animal noise is added in each verse. Flanders, feigning impatience with it as Swann sings several more verses than strictly necessary, remarks sarcastically "We must have it in full some night. Alternate it with The Ring Cycle."
• "A Transport of Delight"—with an increasing refrain about the "Big six-wheeler, scarlet-painted, London Transport, diesel-engined, ninety-seven–horse-power omnibus".
• "20 Tons of TNT"—a song about thermonuclear weapons.
• "The War of 14–18"—a translation of a French song by Georges Brassens, this song 'celebrates' World War I.
• "The Wompom"—a tale about a fictitious all-purpose creature/plant/raw material.
• "Twosome: Kang & Jag" (Kangaroo and Jaguar)—two more animal songs sung as a pair. The title recalls "Cav and Pag" i.e. Cavalleria rusticana and I Pagliacci, which are often performed together.

A very rare song, "Vendor Librorum Floreat" (Let the bookseller flourish), was released as a single in 1960. It was written for the annual American Booksellers Association, the only known time Flanders & Swann accepted a private commission.