Josephine Cameron: Music

• MP3 short clip, hi-fi play (broadband)
• MP3 short clip, lo-fi play (modem)

This beautiful, nearly-forgotten song was wildly popular during World War I. It became so popular and so over-played that Carrie Jacobs-Bond herself became quite tired of it. (She tells a funny story in her biography, Roads of Melody, about an Austrian composer who believed that the song was the U.S. national anthem.) But it is a lovely, bittersweet song and should not be forgotten. The melodies that Jacobs-Bond writes, often have a reverential, church-like quality, and this inspired Gerhard Graml with the idea to invite the Waynflete Children's Choir to sing with me for the last verse. Which they did, with heartbreaking innocence. Carrie Jacobs-Bond was the first famous woman composer of popular songs, and her story is amazing. She single-handedly built up a publishing empire in a time when such a thing was unheard of, especially for a woman. Plus, she's from Janesville, Wisconsin, which is not too far from where I grew up! So I intend to spend a lot more time learning about her, and performing her songs, in the hope that her story and her songs will not be forgotten, but continue to touch and inspire. I hope you enjoy this song as much as I do.

When you come to the end of a perfect day
And you sit all alone with your thoughts
When the chimes ring out with a carol gay
For the joy that the day has brought

Do you think what the end of a perfect day
Can mean to a tired heart?
When the sun goes down with a flaming ray
And the dear friends have to part

Ainsi Vient l'adieu de ce jour divin
Tel qu'arrive l'adieu supreme
Mais un souvenir radieux et saint
De su gloire reste tout de meme
Le doux souvenir de ce jour divin
Un don precieux revele
Car a nous appartient sur ce jour divin
L'ame pure d'un ami fidele