Harrow Songs

By Dale Vargas (Druries 19523)

Harrow’s collection of schools songs is unique. It is one of the characteristics, along with the Hill itself, Harrow football and hats, that makes Harrow distinctive. The songs appeal to a fundamental human emotion: the pleasure of singing together. ‘Throat’s idle pastime? No, no, no!’ wrote Edward Bowen, the architect of this wonderful tradition. Like eating and drinking, dancing and playing games, community singing is enjoyable and our songs create a bond between Harrovians and their fellows and the Hill, which ‘never can be undone’.

Before the public-school boom of the mid-19th century, music had played little or no part in school life; boys were subjected to a relentless diet of classical texts, leavened only by afternoons of football and cricket. One of the ways in which the more enlightened head masters of this era sought to encourage in their pupils a sense of pride in their alma mater was the singing of a school song or songs.

As Latin was the lingua franca of the classroom, it is no surprise to find that these songs were mostly in Latin, for example Carmen Etonense, Winchester’s Dulce Domum, Floreat Rugbeia and Carmen Carthusianum. Io Triumphe, written in 1864 by Brooke Westwood, House Master of Grove Hill (later Rendalls), who became Bishop of Durham, is a hymn of praise of the School (Herga being Harrow, and “Io triumphe” being the shout of the victorious legions returning to Rome). It might have become the ‘School song’ – although it lacks the gravitas – had it not been for the later acclaim of Forty Years On.

Harrow’s collection of school songs stems from the brilliant collaboration of Edward Bowen, sometime House Master of The Grove, and John Farmer, ‘organist and instructor in music’, encouraged by Head Master, Montagu Butler, who can be credited with inventing “Harrovianism”, the idea that boys and Old Boys become irrevocably attached to their school.

Songs are sung in Houses about twice a term. Traditions vary from House to House: several have their own House Songs, but ‘put-ons’ are usually a feature. Groups of boys are ‘put on’ to sing particular verses as directed by the master of ceremonies, the Head of House.

For the new boy, House Songs must seem bafflingly weird and to have to sing a solo – the first four lines of the March of the Men of Harlech – both inexplicable and embarrassing. Why not Five Hundred Faces? Ah, that is reserved for just three soloists a year in front of the whole School: for Churchill Songs, Harrow Association Songs and Speech Day. ‘And the time will come as the years go by, when your heart will thrill at the thought of the Hill. . .’ And it does. Old Harrovians gather all over the world to dine and sing. ‘Pray charge your glasses, gentlemen and drink to Harrow’s honour...’ I have attended Songs in places as widely spread as Hong Kong, Cape Town and New York.

Top: Churchill in Speech Room with Head Master RW Moore in 1950. Above left: Harrovians cheering Churchill outside The Head Master’s, 1955. Above right, from left to right: Captain David Margesson (The Grove 19043), Secretary for War; AP Boissier, Head Master; Winston Churchill (The Head Master’s 18883), Prime Minister; Detective; Leo Amery (West Acre 18873), Secretary of State for India & Burma; Jock Colville (The Head Master’s 19283), Private Secretary to the Prime Minister; John Moore-Brabazon (Elmfield 18981), Minister of Transport; Geoffrey Lloyd (Newlands 19153), Parliamentary Secretary for Petroleum; Gerald Rivington (West Acre 19072), Chairman of Governors.

John Farmer

The mystery is how Harrow’s rich collection of songs has survived where those of other schools have died. The answer must lie in their quality. Bowen and Farmer had able successors. Edmund Howson nearly matched Bowen in the way in which he caught the spirit of School life. And although Bowen feared that the flow might stop when Farmer left, his successor, Eaton Faning (Ducker, Here Sir!, Stet Fortuna Domus and Left! Right!) added some beautiful tunes. Percy Buck, longer in post but less prolific, wrote the music for George Townsend Warner’s heart-rending solo about the Boer War, You?, and The Silver Arrow. Another distinguished composer, Reginald Thatcher, only at Harrow for nine years, wrote John Lyon’s Road and The Song of the Forwards. The tradition has continued.

The modern Song Book contains over 50 songs, many more than can be sung on a regular basis. It is perhaps unfortunate that the old favourites, Ducker, Raleigh, The Silver Arrow, Queen Elizabeth, Stet Fortuna and Giants dominate. Add Willow the King and A Gentleman’s a-Bowling for cricketing occasions, The Song of the Forwards for rugby, Three Yards and Plump a Lump for football and there isn’t room for many more.

The popularity of certain songs varies from generation to generation. I confess to being drawn to the best tunes (in my opinion) and so I just love singing Songs, Here Sir!, Grandpapa’s Granpapa and Fairies. A few years ago, I arranged some evenings of ‘forgotten songs’. Although some wag said he could understand why they had been forgotten, we found some hidden gems. I wonder how many of those present this evening know Lyon of Preston, Cats and Dogs and Boy!?

Perhaps, it is the organic nature of the collection that ensures its continuity. To the modern ear, the lyrics of many of the older songs seem dated: Boy! is all about fagging, a long-extinct practice, and only those who learned their mathematics a long time ago know what Euclid is all about, but these songs, although sung less frequently, have a charm, nonetheless. Meanwhile, new kids appear on the block. Home to the Hill, written by Tom Wickson and Richard Walker, has become very popular.

Special occasions have often inspired special songs or verses. When Sir Stanley Jackson’s (The Head Master’s 18843) XI won the 1888 match at Lord’s, Head Master James Welldon commissioned Bowen to write a song about it – and gave him three days off school in which to do it. When Head Master Cyril Norwood wanted to boost the newly adopted rugby football, he wrote The Song of the Forwards. These two songs are regularly sung but The Centenarian, written to celebrate the centenary of Speech Room, and Donorum Dei for the 50th anniversary of

Harrow Association Songs in Speech Room 2019

Winston Churchill’s first visit, two excellent songs, are sung rarely and this is regrettable.

On two of the three occasions that Her Late Majesty The Queen Elizabeth II has visited the School, special verses have been written: in 1957 to Queen Elizabeth, and in 1987 to The Silver Arrow. It is appropriate that to mark her Platinum Jubilee and the 450th anniversary of the School’s charter, we shall be singing another special verse of The Silver Arrow, written this time by a distinguished son of Harrow, Robin Butler (Druries 19513) (with a little help from his family).

Finally, a word about Forty Years On, Bowen’s masterpiece, adopted by schools, boys’ and girls’, all over the English-speaking world – even if they don’t know what a ‘base’ is or why you should ‘follow up’. It has become Harrow’s anthem and we stand to sing it. Indeed, I recall an occasion when one of our number collapsed during the song but, like guardsmen on parade, we carried on singing to the end. Fortunately, his condition was not fatal.

Winston Churchill, Harrow’s most famous son, was a great lover of the School’s songs and his visit in 1940 was the first of many, giving rise to this annual celebration of his life, now known as Churchill Songs. The anecdote of the prime minister being heard by his private secretary, Jock Colville, singing St. Joles – the patron saint of the lazy boy – in the bath, has been told many times. In 1955, he wrote of Harrow’s songs, ‘They shine through the memories of men far and wide throughout the world in which we live. They cheer and enlighten us. They breed a bond of unity between those who have lived here and I think they are, on the whole, the most precious inheritance of all Harrovians.’

There will be many in the Royal Albert Hall this evening, feeble of foot maybe, shorter in wind for sure, who will echo these words. ‘One magic thrall unites us all, the name and fame of Harrow.’

EE Bowen