"My Son, My Son" is a

traditional popular music Traditional pop (also known as vocal pop or pre-rock and roll pop) is Western culture, Western pop music that generally pre-dates the advent of rock and roll in the mid-1950s. The most popular and enduring songs from this era of music are known ...

song A song is a musical composition performed by the human voice. The voice often carries the melody (a series of distinct and fixed pitches) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs have a structure, such as the common ABA form, and are usu ...

written Writing is the act of creating a persistent representation of language. A writing system includes a particular set of symbols called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which they encode a particular spoken language. Every written language ...

by Gordon Melville Rees, Bob Howard and Eddie Calvert in 1954. A

recording A record, recording or records may refer to: An item or collection of data Computing * Record (computer science), a data structure ** Record, or row (database), a set of fields in a database related to one entity ** Boot sector or boot record, re ...

of the song by

Vera Lynn Dame Vera Margaret Lynn (; 20 March 1917 – 18 June 2020) was an English singer and entertainer whose musical recordings and performances were very popular during World War II. She is Honorific nicknames in popular music, honorifically known ...

reached number one in the UK Singles Chart in November that year. It was Lynn's only UK number one hit on the official chart, a feat she achieved long after the period she became most associated with as the Forces' Sweetheart in

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. However, there was no official singles sales chart in the UK at that time, so her recordings of songs which she has subsequently become more familiar with, such as her 1939 signature song, "

We'll Meet Again "We'll Meet Again" is a 1939 song by English singer Vera Lynn with music and lyrics composed and written by English songwriters Ross Parker and Hughie Charles. The song is one of the most famous of the Second World War era, resonating with ...

", did not feature on any contemporary charts. Earlier, in July 1952, she had reached number one on the

U.S. The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguous ...

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertis ...

chart A chart (sometimes known as a graph) is a graphics, graphical representation for data visualization, in which "the data is represented by symbols, such as bars in a bar chart, lines in a line chart, or slices in a pie chart". A chart can repres ...

with her recording of " Auf Wiederseh'n Sweetheart", making her the first British artist to achieve this milestone. This was several months before the launch of the UK singles chart in November of that year, when it peaked at number 10; the song had, however, already reached number one on the UK's sheet music chart. "My Son, My Son" was Lynn's fifth singles chart hit in the UK, following on from "Auf Wiederseh'n Sweetheart", "Forget-Me-Not", "The Homing Waltz" (all 1952) and "The Windsor Waltz" (1953). Lynn's version of the song was produced by Frank Lee and released on

Decca Records Decca Records is a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis (Decca), Edward Lewis after his acquisition of a gramophone manufacturer, The Decca Gramophone Company. It set up an American subsidiary under the Decca name, which bec ...

F.10372. The full credit on Lynn's record read 'Vera Lynn with Frank Weir, his

Saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to p ...

, his

Orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * String instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, ...

and

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'. When the song topped the charts, co-writer Calvert became the second number-one recording star, after

Mantovani Annunzio Paolo Mantovani (; 15 November 1905 – 30 March 1980) was an Italian British conductor, composer and light orchestra-styled entertainer with a cascading strings musical signature. The book '' British Hit Singles & Albums'' ...

, to write a number one hit for someone else. A recording by

Frankie Vaughan Frankie Vaughan (born Frank Fruim Abelson; 3 February 1928 – 17 September 1999) was an English singer and actor who recorded more than 80 easy listening and traditional pop singles in his lifetime. He was known as "Mr. Moonlight" after his ...

and Vocal Group with Geoff Love and his orchestra was made in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

on September 19, 1954. It was released by

EMI EMI Group Limited (formerly EMI Group plc until 2007; originally an initialism for Electric and Musical Industries, also referred to as EMI Records or simply EMI) was a British transnational conglomerate founded in March 1931 in London. At t ...

on the

His Master's Voice His Master's Voice is an entertainment trademark featuring a dog named Nipper, curiously peering into the horn of a wind-up gramophone. Painted by Francis Barraud in 1898, the image has since become a global symbol used across consumer elect ...

label as catalog number B 10766.

References

{{Authority control 1954 singles Vera Lynn songs UK singles chart number-one singles Pop ballads Decca Records singles

See also

References