{"id":3395,"date":"2020-06-04T16:20:15","date_gmt":"2020-06-04T16:20:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/?page_id=3395"},"modified":"2020-11-20T10:01:43","modified_gmt":"2020-11-20T10:01:43","slug":"in-these-old-lavender-trousers","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/folksongandmusichall.com\/index.php\/in-these-old-lavender-trousers\/","title":{"rendered":"In these old Lavender Trousers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
AKA<\/strong><\/td>In these old Khaki Trousers<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
Lyrics<\/strong><\/td>RP Weston and Harry Bedford<\/td>Music<\/strong><\/td> RP Weston and Harry Bedford<\/td>Roud<\/strong><\/td>RN21943<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Music Hall performers<\/strong><\/td>Harry Bedford, 1910s, 20s<\/td><\/tr>
Folk performances<\/strong><\/td>Source Singers<\/strong>
Reg Bacon, 1959, Essex, England
Sid Cooke, 1964, Suffolk, England
Bill Smith, 1979, Shropshire, England
Modern Performances<\/strong>
Den Giddens, 2003<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n
I know what you're looking at, people. What you've got your eyes on I can tell.\nIt's these dear old lavender trousers, wishing you'd a pair like them as well.\nMy granddad left them to me so I could look a toff,\nAnd I said till I was dead, I would never take them off.\n\nIn these old lavender trousers I've skipped and jumped and skated,\nLaughed and wept, worked and slept, and twice been vaccinated.\nI've drunk four ale, I've drunk champagne, been up the pole and down a drain.\nI won the heart of Mary Jane in these old lavender trousers!<\/em>\n\nLate last night I toddled in Lipton's. Everybody yelled, \"Here's someone big!\nWho's that in those lavender trousers? Henery the eighth or Lipton's pig?\"\nI ran round the counter quick, and when I wasn't seen,\nDown my legs I stowed some eggs, and a roll of margarine,\n\nIn these old lavender trousers. But soon I did feel shocking!\nI turned green. The margarine was running down my stocking.\nLipton called a man in blue, then all the eggs were hatching too.\nAll the little chicks went, \"Cock-a-doodle-doo!\" in these old lavender trousers.<\/em>\n\nOnce when I was staying in Brighton, mashing all the girls on the prom, what-what!\nDazzling them with my lavender trousers, suddenly the girls yelled out, \"Great Scott!\"\nSome old chap was running round wrapped up in wet seaweed,\nShouting, \"Dogs, they've pinched my togs!\" so like a friend in need,\n\nIn these old lavender trousers, said I, \"There's room for two, sir!\nThough you're fat, and I'm like that, I'm sure there's room for you, sir!\"\nAnd all the girls began to screech, for he and I had one leg each,\nAnd arm in arm we toddled up the beach in these old lavender trousers.<\/em>\n\nLast year we had a week in Blackpool, hadn't got a trunk or a bag, and so\nPacked the things in the back of my trousers. I was a walking portmanteau.\nWhen we reached the station, Oh! My missus, what a brain!\nSaid, \"don't pay for the kid, you jay! Smuggle him into the train.\"\n\nIn these old lavender trousers, I pushed our little Sammy,\nWalked right thro', and paid for two: me and his dear mammy.\nBut that kid, when the guard came round, got me pinched and fined a pound,\n'Cos he poked his head thro' a hole that he had found in these old lavender trousers.<\/em>\n\nOnce I was a tragedy actor\u2014thirty bob a week, and a real big star!\nWhen the limelight shone on these trousers, ladies in the stalls would faint\u2014ah, ah!\nIn the drama \"Dirty Dick\" I fairly froze their blood,\nTill the lords up in the \"gawds\" started throwing lumps of mud.\n\nIn these old lavender trousers, to act I wasn't willin'.\nThey kicked me on and the limelight shone, and the heroine said, \"Vill'in!\nHave you no heart for a woman's woe? No tender feeling at all? No, no!\"\nThen I rubbed my patch and I said, \"What oh!\" in these old lavender trousers.<\/em><\/pre>\n\n\n\n
Harry Bedford (1873-1939) is often dismissed as a “one-hit wonder” famous for A little bit off the top<\/em> and not much else:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Harry Bedford, a red-nosed, baggy-trousered comedian who had one song that made him in 1898 in which he sang the next 20 years.<\/p>Mander and Mitchenson, 1975<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n
He was born in London, worked as an apprentice boatbuilder, but became a full-time professional in 1888, initially as a blackface minstrel. Often derided as a “low comedian” referring to his tendency to perform risqu\u00e9 material. His other early hit was The Cock of the North<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This song, which he and RP Weston<\/a> published in 1912, lives on in the folk world. It regularly pops up in singarounds, and seems to have been particularly popular in the south-east of England.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sources:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n