Henry Robert Clifton (baptised 20 May 1832 – 15 July 1872) was an English music hall singer, songwriter and entertainer. A prolific composer in the popular genre, his most successful song was " Pretty Polly Perkins of Paddington Green".

Biography

The son of a carpenter, Clifton was born in

Hoddesdon Hoddesdon () is a town in the Borough of Broxbourne, Hertfordshire, lying entirely within the London Metropolitan Area and Greater London Urban Area. The area is on the River Lea and the Lee Navigation along with the New River. Hoddesdon ...

, Hertfordshire. He was orphaned as a child, and little is known of his early adulthood. By the early 1860s he had become well known as a singer and songwriter in the

song and supper room A song and supper room was a dining club in mid-nineteenth century Victorian England in which entertainment and good food were provided. They provided an alternative to formal theatre and music hall with a convivial atmosphere in which the custo ...

s and early music halls of London. Nicknamed "Handsome Harry Clifton" during his career,Monuments Restored
, The Friends of Kensal Green Cemetery; retrieved 22 May 2014. his repertoire included comic songs, Irish songs, and "motto songs", with an improving moral message, such as "Paddle Your Own Canoe" (1864). Clifton's songs were described as "equally popular and acceptable in the drawing-rooms of the rich as in the cottages of the poor". Many taught a moral lesson; for example, "Pretty Polly Perkins", published in 1863, was about the pitfalls of pride and vanity. He wrote his own lyrics. Although some of his songs relied on tunes by composers such as Charles Coote, most adapted their tunes from old folk songs. Other songs included "The Dark Girl Dress'd in Blue", "There's Nothing Succeeds Like Success", "It's Better to Laugh Than to Cry", and "Work, Boys, Work, and Be Contented!". A list of songs for sale held at the British Library names fifteen songs by Harry Clifton, described as "without exception, the best comic songs of the day". Lithographs of several of his other songs are also held in the British Library online archive, including "The Dark Girl Dress'd in Blue" (which has a colour portrait of Clifton on the front page), "Isabella, The Barber's Daughter" and "The Railway Bell(e)".
British Library online gallery; retrieved 22 May 2014. Clifton undertook a nationwide tour between 1865 and 1867, with his own Cosmopolitan Concert Company, and for some years lived in

Glasgow Glasgow ( ; sco, Glesca or ; gd, Glaschu ) is the most populous city in Scotland and the fourth-most populous city in the United Kingdom, as well as being the 27th largest city by population in Europe. In 2020, it had an estimated popul ...

. He was married and had one child, Fanny Alice, who died aged six months. He died aged 40 in Shepherd's Bush, London, and is buried in

Kensal Green Cemetery Kensal Green Cemetery is a cemetery in the Kensal Green area of Queens Park in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London, England. Inspired by Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, it was founded by the barrister George Frederick ...

. One of his obituaries stated: "The popularity which his songs attained is best denoted by the fact that even now they are whistled by every street-boy, played by every barrel organ and sung in every town and hamlet in the United Kingdom." The critic

Peter Gammond Peter Gammond (30 September 1925 – 6 May 2019) was a British music critic, writer, journalist, musician, poet, and artist. Peter Gammond was born in Winnington, Northwich, Cheshire. The son of John Thomas Gammond (1892–1970), a clerk, a ...

describes Clifton as "one of the great pioneers of music-hall song." Clifton's work survives (in an adapted form) into the present day, as the Tyneside Music Hall song Cushie Butterfield (still sung at Newcastle United matches) is sung to the same tune as "Pretty Polly Perkins" and is a parody of it.

References

External links

The Railway Children (1970) SoundtracksDiscussion thread at ''Mudcat.org''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Clifton, Harry Robert 1832 births 1872 deaths 19th-century British composers 19th-century British male singers English songwriters People from Hoddesdon British male songwriters