"The Arguing Wife"

Radio Record, Volume II, Issue 34, 8 March 1929, Page 9

"The Arguing Wife"

A True Story ; AL songs must have some story connected with their origin, but rarely is the story known. Here, however, is the true story of the birth of "The Arguing Wife," which was sung by Mr. Harrison Cook at the special D.1.C. concert given "over the air" on February 28. Mr. Gwynne Davies (the composer of the song), and Mr. Harison Cook were both principals in the Carl Rosa Opera Company and had been singing at a concert in South Wales. During the long train journey up to Scotland, where they were rejoining their opera company, they went along to the dining car for the second sitting of lunch and, as many of the passengers who had been in for the first sitting had conveniently left papers behind on the seats, they both started to read while waiting for the soup to be served. Gwynne Davies suddenly passed the paper he was reading to the basso, with the remark: "How’s that for a set of lyries, Harry?" Cook read the poem and passing the paper back, said, "They'd make a great song for --" (mentioning a popular ballad singer of the time). "Damn--," said Davies, "I’ll write "a song for you."

. 4 5 Nothing more was said about the song till some few weeks jater when they had finished lunch in rooms under the shadow of the great Minster at York and Gwynne Davies went over to the piano, remarking, "How d’you like this?" and started playing a melody which he had set to the words found in the train. * You will notice that the melody to the third verse is different from that to the other verses, but it is not the original tune; for the basso, when askec his opinion, said he did not like the original to that verse to which remark the composer replied that he would change it. And he did. A ,-eek or two later Mr. Harrison Cook sang the song as it now stands at the Winter Gardens, Blackpool, at the Whit Sunday concert, May, 1921, and caused great merriment among the audience when he sang the peculiarly appropriate words, "She'd arg’y from Christmas till Whitsunday night." The composer's original manuscript, which he gave to Mr. Cook, was the one Mr. Frank Thomas used at the piano when accompanying the basso the other evening.