"So Long, Farewell" is a song from

Rodgers and Hammerstein Rodgers and Hammerstein was a theater-writing team of composer Richard Rodgers (1902–1979) and lyricist-dramatist Oscar Hammerstein II (1895–1960), who together created a series of innovative and influential American musicals. Their musical ...

’s 1959 musical, ''

The Sound of Music ''The Sound of Music'' is a musical with music by Richard Rodgers, lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II, and a book by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse. It is based on the 1949 memoir of Maria von Trapp, '' The Story of the Trapp Family Singers''. ...

''. It was included in the original Broadway run and was first performed by the Von Trapp children, played by Kathy Dunn, David Gress, Evanna Lien, Mary Susan Locke, Lauri Peters, Marilyn Rogers, Joseph Stewart, and Frances Underhill. "So Long, Farewell" and "Do-Re-Mi" are the only songs which predominantly feature the Von Trapp children. They first perform the song on their own late in the first act for their parents' party guests; when it is reprised near the end of the second act they are joined by Maria (Mary Martin) and The Captain (Theodore Bikel).

Description

"So Long, Farewell" is a simple composition that effectively exploits the children's higher voices and innocent charm. There is one main chorus, repeated several times throughout the song, which is entirely in a major key. It is designed to be a children's song.

Legacy

"So Long, Farewell" was featured in the 1965 film. It is one of the last songs written by

Oscar Hammerstein II Oscar Greeley Clendenning Hammerstein II (; July 12, 1895 – August 23, 1960) was an American lyricist, librettist, theatrical producer, and director in musical theater for nearly 40 years. He won eight Tony Awards and two Academy Award ...

, who died nine months after the play opened. The band

Laibach Laibach () is a Slovenian and Yugoslav avant-garde music group associated with the industrial, martial, and neoclassical genres. Formed in 1980 in the mining town of Trbovlje, Slovenia, at the time a constituent republic within Socialist Fede ...

released a video for "So Long, Farewell" on March 14, 2019. It depicts a

Goebbels Paul Joseph Goebbels (; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German Nazi politician and philologist who was the ''Gauleiter'' (district leader) of Berlin, chief propagandist for the Nazi Party, and then Reich Minister of Propaganda ...

type family eating dinner in a bunker next to the Swastika Christmas tree from

John Heartfield John Heartfield (born Helmut Herzfeld; 19 June 1891 – 26 April 1968) was a German visual artist who pioneered the use of art as a political weapon. Some of his most famous photomontages were anti-Nazi and anti-fascist statements. Heartfield a ...

's ''O Tannenbaum im deutschen Raum, wie krumm sind deine äste!''. The father (played by Ivan Novak) finishes eating and then leads them one by one through the basement door. According to Laibach the symbolism of this video is that the Von Trapp family never left Nazi controlled Austria but simply went "underground" much like how North Koreans are trapped in their totalitarian country. In their own words, the ''Sound of Music'' ends in "captivity and death." This music video also includes a reference to

Josef Fritzl The Fritzl case was a case that emerged in 2008, when a woman named Elisabeth Fritzl (born 6 April 1966) informed investigators in the city of Amstetten, Lower Austria, that she had been held captive for 24 years by her father, Josef Fritzl ( ...

with the father leading his children to the basement. Milan Fras makes a physical appearance at the end of the video as a nun. In 2023, the cast of

Ted Lasso ''Ted Lasso'' ( ) is an American sports film, sports comedy-drama television series developed by Jason Sudeikis, Bill Lawrence (TV producer), Bill Lawrence, Brendan Hunt, and Joe Kelly. It is based on a character Sudeikis portrayed in a series ...

released a cover of the song for the series finale of the same name as this song.

References

{{Rodgers and Hammerstein 1959 songs Songs from The Sound of Music Songs with music by Richard Rodgers Songs with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II