Weston and Lee

Bert Lee (1880 – 1946) was born in Ravensthorpe, Yorkshire. He worked as a piano tuner as a young man, but entered the entertainment business as a Pierrot clown. RP Weston (1878 – 1936) was a pseudonym for Robert Harris, who was born and raised in London. Legend is that he started work at an engineering firm but was sacked for writing songs on the back of emery paper. He moved to Weston-super-Mare and joined a comedy double act, taking on the name Weston.

Both men became full-time songwriters, working together as “Weston and Lee” – perhaps the most famous songwriters in Music Hall. They were introduced to each other by their music publisher, David Day of Francis, Day and Hunter; they worked together for 20 years producing more than 3000 songs and hundreds of sketches. Some of the better-known hits included: Good-bye-eee, Paddy McGinty’s Goat, and Lloyd George’s Beer . They famously wrote a number of sketches and songs for Stanley Holloway. They both wrote both words and music, alternating between the two, but according to Bert: “Bob has the brains. I put the laughs in.”

The songs

Weston and Lee together, apart and with others, were writing songs and sketches both at the height of the commercial Music Halls before World War I, and during its relatively rapid decline between the wars. They also wrote for many pantomimes, revues, radio shows and other entertainment formats.

They wrote plenty of tearjerkers and romantic songs, but few of them are remembered in the folk world or elsewhere. Almost all the ones we remember today are their comic songs.

Some of the songs are listed below. I have included as many as I can find that are linked to folk – by cross-referencing what’s in the Roud Index with lists I have compiled of all their known songs . I have also included a small selection of their “classic” Music Hall songs, not usually thought of as folksongs.

Weston and Lee

  1. All I want is a proper cup of coffee (V53398)
  2. All the girls are busy knitting jumpers (23895)
  3. Any dirty work today? (29705)
  4. The Body in the bag (24557)
  5. Do you want us to lose the war (29707)
  6. I’ve got rings on my fingers (5760)
  7. It won’t last very very long (10710)
  8. Lloyd George’s Beer (V53407)
  9. Lloyd George of Criccieth (29796)
  10. My meatless day (2413)
  11. Our little garden sub bub (5394)
  12. Paddy McGinty’s Goat (18235)
  13. Rawtenstall Annual fair (23972)
  14. She was poor but she was honest (9621)
  15. Sing! sing! why shouldn’t we sing? (12910)
  16. Somebody would shout out shop (21924)
  17. Swim Sam Swim (21945)
  18. The gypsy warned me (25548)
  19. With her head tucked underneath her arm

Weston alone or with others

  1. Boys of the Chelsea School (29701)
  2. End of me old cigar, The (17697)
  3. Hobnailed boots that my father wore, The (16705)
  4. Henery the Eighth I am
  5. Here comes Oxo (30200 )
  6. I Don’t Care If There’s a Girl There (29389)
  7. If you meet a Vessel in Distress (5375)
  8. In these hard times (23324)
  9. In these old Lavender Trousers (21943)
  10. Little Willie’s Woodbines (17695)
  11. Never let your braces dangle (27923)
  12. Scented soap (21985 )
  13. Tickle me, Timothy do (23498)
  14. We’re living at the cloisters (29778)
  15. What a mouth (32455)
  16. When father papered the parlour (24529)
  17. Where are the lads of the village tonight? (25462)

Bert Lee alone or with others

  1. Four-and-nine(8106)
  2. Knees up Mother Brown (23634)
  3. Nobody noticed me (18433)
  4. We really had a most delightful evening (25285)
  5. Who’s your lady friend?

“All the known songs”

These lists are bound to underestimate their full output. I have generated the lists by combining all songs listed on the WorldCat site as being available as sheet music in a library somewhere in the world, with the lists in Kilgarriff’s book. There are 466 songs written or co-written by RP Weston, of these 295 were “Weston and Lee songs ” co-written with Bert Lee. In addition Bert Lee wrote a further 71 songs either by himself or with others .

All songs-by-RP-Weston alone and with othersDownload
All songs by Bert Lee-without-Weston-Download
All songs-by-Weston-and-LeeDownload

Sources

Other songs worth investigation: Charabanc by Weston and Lee, published 1921 : is it the same song as The charabanc song (30206)?

Remembered by Alice Kane: Worse you are the more the ladies love you, The (25400)

Remembered In “Sprite’s Article” Fair, fat and forty : I like em! I like em!(24471), Good-bye-ee (10939)