I'm Wearing My Heart Away For You

Letra y Música: Chas. K. Harris

(Chas. K. Harris, New York, 1902)

Letra:

I wonder where you are tonight, my love,

As all alone I sit and dream.

I wonder  if your heart´s with me tonight,

And if the same stars for you gleam.

I sometimes fear there is another, love,

Some fairer face has won your heart;

But Ah, I hope the day will never come,

The day that we two must live apart.

Chorus

I´m wearing my heart away for you,

It cries aloud, "My love be true".

I dream of you by night,

I long for you by day,

I´m wearing my heart away for you.

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 Columbia 1650. J.W. Myers [#5, 03.1904]

Otras versiones: 

👉🏽 Edison 8267. Franklyn Wallace (1902)

👉🏽 Edison 8267. James Reed (1905)

👉🏽 Victor 1854. John Bieling & Harry Macdonough (1903)

👉🏽 Columbia 32358. J.W. Myers (1904) 

👉🏽 Columbia 32407. Henry Burr (1904) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 1720. Henry Burr (1904)

👉🏽 Zonophone 5686. Franklyn Wallace (1903)

👉🏽 Zonophone 6092. James Reed (1905)

👉🏽 Standard 1911. J.W. Myers (1904)

👉🏽 Imperial 44911. Frank C. Stanley (1906)

I´ll Be With You When The Roses Bloom Again

Letra: Will D. Cobb; Música: Gus Edwards

(F.A. Mills, New York, 1901)

La canción escenifica el momento en que un soldado ha de partir hacia la guerra, despidiéndose de su novia con una promesa: "si no se encuentra entre los caídos, regresará junto a ella, cuando las rosas florezcan de nuevo".

Letra:

They are roaming in the gloaming, where the roses are in bloom,

Just a soldier and his sweetheart, staunch and true, 

But her heart is filled with sorrow, and her thoughts are of the morrow, 

As she pins a rose up on his coat of blue. 

"Do not ask me, love, to linger, for you know not what you say, 

When my duty calls, my sweetheart´s voice is vain, 

But your need not be sighing, If I´m not among the dying, 

I´ll be with you when the roses bloom again". 

Chorus

When the roses bloom again beside the river,

And the robin redbreast sings his sweet refrain,

As in days of Auld Lang Syne,

I´ll be with you, sweetheart, mine,

I´ll be with you whrn the roses bloom again.

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 Edison 7942. Harry Macdonough [#3, 12.1901]

Otras versiones:

👉🏽 Victor 1097. Harry Macdonough (1901)

👉🏽 Victor 1116. Joseph Natus (1901)

👉🏽 Columbia 357. George J. Gaskin (1901)

👉🏽 Columbia 31724. J.W. Myers (1902)

👉🏽 Columbia 31673. Henry Burr (1904) 🔊

👉🏽 Climax 357. Harry Macdonough (1901)

👉🏽 Climax 598. Joseph Natus (1902)

👉🏽 Edison 8276. Harry Macdonough (1902)

👉🏽 Zonophone 686. Joseph Natus (1902)

👉🏽 Zonophone 714. Hager´s Orchestra (1902)

👉🏽 Zonophone 725. Frank C. Stanley (1902)

👉🏽 Zonophone 1015. Atwood Twitchell (1902)

Come Down, Ma Evenin' Star

Letra: Edgar Smith; Música: John Stromberg

(M. Witmark & Sons, New York, 1902)

Letra:

When from out de shades ob night

Come de stars a shinin´ bright,

I spy de one I do love I recognize ma true love

Amid de tiny orbs ob light.

Search de sky from East to West,

She´s de brightest an´ de best,

But she´s so far above me

I knows she cannot love me

Still I loves her an´ more dan all de rest.

Refrain

Ma evenin´ star I wonder who you are,

Set up so high like a diamond in de sky.

No matter what I do...

I can´t go up to you,

So come down from dar, ma evenin´star.

Come down!, Come dawn!

Come dawn from dar, ma evenin´ star.

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 Columbia 955. Mina Hickman [#1, 01.1903]

👉🏽 Columbia 1405. Henry Burr [#1, 07.1903]

The Rosary

Letra: Robert Cameron Rogers; Música: Ethelbert Woodbridge Nevin

(The Boston Music Co., Boston, 1900)

Letra:

The hours I spent with thee, dear heart,

Are as a string of pearls to me;

I count them over ev´ry one apart,

My rosary, my rosary!

Each hour a pearl, each pearl a prayer

To still a heart in absence wrung,

I tell each bead unto the end,

And there a Cross is hung.

O, memories that bless and burn!

O, barren gain and bitter loss!

I kiss each bead, and strive at last to learn

To kiss the Cross, sweetheart! to kiss the Cross

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 Victor 2332. William H. Thompson [#2, 09.1903]

👉🏽 Columbia 1354. Henry Burr [#3, 06.1903] 🔊

👉🏽 Victor 4676. Alan Turner [#8, 07.1906]

👉🏽 Victor 88108. Ernestine Schumann-Heink [#8, 05.1908]

👉🏽 Victor 64257. John McCormack [#4, 10.1912]

👉🏽 Columbia 1815. Taylor Trio [#8, 01.1916]

Darling Nelly Gray

Letra y Música: Benjamin Russell Hanby

(Oliver Ditson & Co., Boston, 1856)

Benjamin Hanby (1833-1867) compuso esta balada antiesclavista a los 23 años, cursando aun sus estudios en la Otterbein University de Westerville (Ohio), inspirado en un hecho que conmovió a toda su familia. Cierto día llegó a casa de los Hanby, en Rushville (Ohio), un esclavo negro procedente de Kentucky, Joseph Selby, que había logrado escapar de la plantación donde trabajaba. Terriblemente enfermo, Selby les contó la angustiosa historia de su huida, que tuvo que emprender dejando atrás a su amada. El padre de Benjamin, el obispo William Hanby, un ministro de los United Brethren (Hermanos Unidos) comenzó a recaudar fondos para liberar a la amada de Selby, pero este murió de neumonía.

En la balada de Hanby, tal vez inspirada en "Maggie May", una canción folk del área de Liverpool, también se produce una separación forzosa. El protagonista, un esclavo de Kentucky llora a su amada, que ha sido vendida a los dueños de otra plantación, al sur de Georgia (donde la vida del esclavo se consideraba convencionalmente más dura). Entonces él muere y se une a ella en el cielo. La canción se hizo muy popular en los años previos a la Guerra Civil y ayudó a promover la causa abolicionista.

Posteriormente esta melodía (o la de "Maggie May") fue utilizada por el cantante de music hall Joe Wilson para su famosa canción Keep yor feet still Geordie hinny (1858).

Letra:

There's a low, green valley, on the old Kentucky shore.

Where I've whiled many happy hours away,

A-sitting and a-singing by the little cottage door,

Where lived my darling Nelly Gray.

Chorus

Oh! my poor Nelly Gray, they have taken you away,

And I'll never see my darling any more;

I'm sitting by the river and I'm weeping all the day.

For you've gone from the old Kentucky shore.

When the moon had climbed the mountain and the stars were shining too.

Then I'd take my darling Nelly Gray,

And we'd float down the river in my little red canoe,

While my banjo sweetly I would play.

One night I went to see her, but "She's gone!" the neighbors say.

The white man bound her with his chain;

They have taken her to Georgia for to wear her life away,

As she toils in the cotton and the cane.

My canoe is under water, and my banjo is unstrung;

I'm tired of living any more;

My eyes shall look downward, and my song shall be unsung

While I stay on the old Kentucky shore.

My eyes are getting blinded, and I cannot see my way.

Hark! there's somebody knocking at the door.

Oh! I hear the angels calling, and I see my Nelly Gray.

Farewell to the old Kentucky shore.

Chorus

Oh, my darling Nelly Gray, up in heaven there they say,

That they'll never take you from me any more.

I'm a-coming-coming-coming, as the angels clear the way,

Farewell to the old Kentucky shore!

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 Decca 1245. Louis Armstrong & Mills Brothers (1937) [#19, 12.06.37] 🔊

Otras versiones:

👉🏽 Columbia 3412. William Tuson (1897-98) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 4615. John W. Myers (1904-09) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 32836. Columbia Quartette (1905) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 770. Carroll Clark (1909) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 1143. Alice Nielsen (1912) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 6059. Lucy Gates (1918) 🔊

👉🏽 Columbia 54-M. Alice Nielsen (1922) 🔊

👉🏽 Edison 3615.  William Tuson (1898-99) 🔊

👉🏽 Edison GM 3615.  William Tuson (1902) 🔊

👉🏽 Edison 10053. Metropolitan Quartette (1909) 🔊

👉🏽 Edison 712. Metropolitan Quartette (1911) 🔊

👉🏽 Edison 1860. Metropolitan Quartet (1913) 🔊

👉🏽 Victor 912. American Quartet (1901)

👉🏽 Victor 3515. American Quartet (1901)

👉🏽 Victor 1387. Haydn Quartet (1902)

👉🏽 Victor 31044. Haydn Quartet (1905)

👉🏽 Victor 16174. Haydn Quartet (1908)

👉🏽 Victor 17888. Samuel Gardner (1915)

👉🏽 Victor 18195. Peerless Quartet (1915)

👉🏽 Victor 64729. Alma Gluck (1917)

👉🏽 Victor 36385. Bill Dickinson (1940)

👉🏽 Lambert 630. American Quartet (1903)

👉🏽 Everlasting 344. Peerless Quartet (1911)

👉🏽 Vocalion 15343. Charlie Oaks (1925)

👉🏽 Bluebird 10114. Les Brown Orchestra (1939)

With All Her Faults, I Love Her Still

Letra y Música: Monroe H. Rosenfeld

(Hitchcock's Music Stores, New York, 1888)

Letra:

With all her faults I love her still, And even though the world should scorn;

No love like hers, my heart can thrill, Although she´s made that heart forlorn

Tho! other hearts have won her love, I bear for her no dreams of ill; 

Her face to me still dear shall be, With all her faults I love, I love her still. 

With all her faults I love her still, And even so till death doth part; 

No love like hers my soul can thrill, No Other love can win my heart; 

I love her still, I love her still, With all her faults I love her still. 

She went away one Summer day, And never came again to me. 

And since that day I long and pray. That I may pass life's dreary sea! 

I see her now as first we met. The sunlight shining o'er her brow; 

The days were joy without alloy. But, ah! my heart, my heart is weary now. 

With all her faults I love her still. And even so till death doth part; 

No love like hers my soul can thrill, No other love can win my heart; 

I love her still, I love her still. With all her faults I love her still. 

With all her faults I love her still, Although her love for me is dead; 

In ev'ry dream her smile doth beam. Nor care I what the world hath said. 

I know that she'll return again. Although her face no more I greet, 

And when this life shall end the strife, I know that we, that we again shall meet. 

With all her faults I love her still, And even so till death doth part; 

No love like hers my soul can thrill, No other love can win my heart; 

I love her still, I love her still, With all her faults I love her still.

Versiones destacadas:

👉🏽 New Jersey. David B. Dana (1891) 🔊

👉🏽 Victor 31171. Richard Jose (1903)

👉🏽 Victor 20779. Maurice J. Gunsky (1926)

👉🏽 Zonophone 5170. Henry Burr (1909)

👉🏽 Everlasting 1446. Will Oakland (1909) 

👉🏽 Columbia 1306. Will Oakland (1912)

👉🏽 Edison 1124. Will Oakland (1912)

👉🏽 Edison 4439. Walter Scanlan (1921)

👉🏽 Edison 50863. Walter Scanlan (1921)