Talk:Abdul Abulbul Amir

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I find the sentence that this is "folk song written by Percy French and later set to music" to be very confusing. Are folk songs written by people? Are songs written then later set to music? I'm too lazy to research this history but I wish someone would.

I guess a song becomes a "Folk Song" when nobody remembers who wrote it, or the author is long dead, the copyright (if any) expired, and nobody cares. This poem used to be widely anthologized under the author's name back in the days when people actually read books.--Saxophobia 20:06, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

It does sound like a contradiction in terms, but there are other cases where a folk song began life as a poem and was later adapted to either a musical air that already existed or was in the appropriate style: Percy French's own "Gortnamona", "Down By The Sally Gardens" by William Butler Yeats, and Jerusalem -- words by William Blake, 1804, music by Hubert Parry, 1916. Another example is where new words were custom-fitted to an existing melody, like The Red Flag by Jim Connell for the tune of "The White Cockade" (and later the much drearier "Tannenbaum"), or "On Raglan Road", by Patrick Kavanagh, for the air "The Dawning of the Day". Of course, if you try that and you're not a Connell or a Kavanagh, you might just end up with filk. Ben-w 05:12, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Eisenhower's favorite song

If you go to the Eisenhower Farm at Gettysburg Pa. as the guide takes you through his main living room the guide will tell you that this was loved by the General. He played it on the piano, and sung it with much gusto but very little quality at family gatherings. Maybe it stems from a marching song during his West Point days. He did not make it to WW1.72.228.50.136 13:56, 12 February 2007 (UTC)