Emma Hanna. Sounds of War: Music in the British Armed Forces During the Great War.

Abstract

When Joan Littlewood and the Theatre Workshop staged Oh! What a Lovely War in 1963, combining wartime soldier’s songs with an end-of-pier music hall staging, they hit on an important truth about the British experience during the Great War: it was a war suffused with music. It is perhaps ironic that the frequently negative reaction by military historians to this production may have held back serious study of this important topic. But Emma Hanna has admirably addressed the resulting gap in Sounds of War. British musical culture in 1914 had reached perhaps a high point for diversity and ubiquity. From promenade concerts to front-parlor pianos, church choirs to folk song revivalists, colliery bands to tea dances, and with the gramophone industry taking off to democratize the audience, it could be argued the role of quotidian music had never been greater. The armed forces were extremely active participants in this culture, with bands performing at parades and in bandstands across the UK. Interestingly, there was considerable concern in 1914 that the standards of military music were in decline. Mobilization posed further problems; army bandsmen doubled as stretcher-bearers, and when they were sent to the front this led to difficulties for military bands on the home front. Almost immediately this was seen as a problem for stirring up the requisite martial emotions at recruiting meetings and for fund-raising drives.