Words and music (c) David Harley

Backup:

 

My kind of Lady (Harley)

You could bite like a shark, you could kick like a mule
And sometimes I felt like the worst kind of fool
My luck ran out on the day that I fell
I always lay trapped between heaven and hell

But you were my kind of lady
Through the highs and the lows, the ups and the downs
You were my kind of lady
And I miss having you around

You were ice and fire, sunshine and rain
You used and abused me and scrambled my brain
But the nights flew by and the days were too long
When you were the singer and I was the song

You were so gentle through loving nights
You were crazy and savage, you knew how to fight
You were sharp as a razor, soft as a sigh
Warm as a kiss and as cold as a lie

Life now is easy, peaceful and calm
Long gentle nights in another girl’s arms
But sometimes I wake from a dream long gone
When I was the singer and you were the song

And you were my lady
Through the highs and the lows, the ups and the downs
You were my kind of lady
And I miss having you around

words and music (c) David Harley

This has been a set of words with a somewhat nebulous tune for quite a few years, but today it insisted on getting some attention. I think this is essentially the finished shape, though I’m certainly going to have to practise it before I sing it in public. Anyway…

backup:

 

And a slightly different take (still rough…)

Backup:

 

For Sarah (Harley)

Sleep on
Sleep sound
The world will turn without you

Sleep on
Sleep sound
Peaceful dreams will find you

Some distant morning
Your innocence
Will brighten

Better days
For someone stronger
Wiser

The wheel will turn again
And you’ll come home

David Harley

A setting of Housman’s poem.  I came across an alternative version I’d forgotten. I didn’t like the vocal much, but I did like the synth and guitars, so I’ve done a little splicing and remixing, though the vocal needs redoing. (The alternative version below is better sung.) To be honest, I’m not altogether sure how I feel about the poem, but it does have a certain power, and may fit into another project.

Backup copy:

An older version with much better vocal:

And a backup:

Another of my settings of Housman’s poems, this time one from Last Poems.

This 1917 poem refers to the British Expeditionary Force, which German propagandists referred to as ‘mercenaries’ because at the outbreak of war, Britain’s army consisted of professional soldiers rather than conscripts or the later volunteers of ‘Kitchener’s Army‘. The BEF was practically wiped out by 1916.

A poem by Hugh MacDiarmid, ‘Another Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries’ takes a very different view, regarding the BEF as ‘professional murderers’.

The setting by Geoffrey Burgon sung by Gillian McPherson on the soundtrack to the Dogs of War is much more dramatic, and very effective (even though some might doubt whether the poem is entirely appropriate in terms of this particular novel and movie). This is much simpler and fits a song cycle I have in mind better. Still, I might rethink that.

Here’s the Housman poem:

Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries

These, in the day when heaven was falling,
The hour when earth’s foundations fled,
Followed their mercenary calling,
And took their wages, and are dead.

Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
They stood, and earth’s foundations stay;
What God abandoned, these defended,
And saved the sum of things for pay.

David Harley