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River Kwai March

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Senning	River Kwai March	Lead	[-]
Posts: 1114 Sep 7 06 1:27 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Tags : None I have a vague recollection that the whistled part of the River Kwai March was a ritualized insult of the British soldiers' officers for which the whistling soldiers could not be punished. The whistled tune then stands for a series of invectives. Can anybody tell us which?
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Syntinen Laulu	Re: River Kwai March	#1	[-]
Posts: 391 Sep 7 06 2:21 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The proper name of the tune is "Colonel Bogey". As sung to me by my father, who learned it in the Cadet Corps in the 1940s, it goes: Bollocks - and the same to you! Bollocks - they make a lovely stew... I don't know if there were any more words to it. But he also often sang another well-known British Army march tune to the words: Did you ever catch your bollocks in a rat trap? - in a rat trap? - or a vice? Did you ever catch your bollocks in a rat trap? 'T isn't nice! [If anybody recognises that one and knows the name of the tune, I'd be obliged to them.] Many of the Army's marching tunes and bugle calls have unprintable words to them. In many armies, for example the French, it's normal for soldiers to be ordered to sing on the march or during training runs, but in the British Army it isn't. This is because nothing on earth will stop the British squaddie from altering the words of any given song in subversive and obscene ways, and there is an ancient and unwritten Army law allowing him to do this.
Senning	Re: River Kwai March	#2	[-]
Posts: 1114 Sep 7 06 2:28 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thanks for an excellent answer.
foolscap(d)	Re: River Kwai March	#3	[-]
Posts: 720 Sep 7 06 4:00 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Over on this side of the Atlantic there's a song sung by almost every camp kid: Do Your Ears Hang Low? Do your ears hang low? Do they wobble to and fro? Can you tie them in a knot? Can you tie them in a bow? Can you throw them o'er your shoulder Like a Continental Soldier? Do your ears hang low? Do your ears hang high? Do they reach up to the sky? Do they wrinkle when they're wet? Do they straighten when they're dry? Can you wave them at your neighbor With an element of flavor? Do your ears hang high? etc. Given the reference to "Continental Soldier", I've often wondered if it dated back to the Revolutionary War and, further, if the lyrics had been bowdlerized for children. Syntinen's explanation above lends some support to the idea.
MoMac	Re: River Kwai March	#4	[-]
Posts: 962 Sep 7 06 4:41 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	*Quote:* I don't know if there were any more words to it I've heard this version Hitler has only got one ball, Gring has two, but very small, Himmler is rather sim'lar, But poor old Goebbels, has no balls at all. Whether that was made up later or not, I don't know.
aldiboronti	Re: River Kwai March	#5	[-]
Posts: 8497 Sep 7 06 4:42 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	There's a variant version of that song. foolscap, sung by British tars. Do your balls hang low, Can you swing them to and fro? Are they made of lead, Can you swing them round your head? Do you get a funny feeling When your bollocks hit the ceiling? Oh, you'll never be a sailor if your balls hang low!
jtab4994	Re: River Kwai March	#6	[-]
Posts: 134 Sep 7 06 5:10 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I learned the "Hitler had only one big ball..." version in grade school in the late 1960's. Our version was sung in the past tense which made me think it was made up after the war. Around the same time I also learned: Comet, it makes your mouth turn green Comet, it tastes like gasoline Comet, it makes you vomit So get some Comet, and vomit, today Comet is a brand of kitchen sink cleanser, so it probably would make you vomit.
aldiboronti	Re: River Kwai March	#7	[-]
Posts: 8497 Sep 7 06 6:18 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The Colonel Bogey march was written in 1914 by Lieutenant Ricketts, a military bandmaster in the Royal Marines at Plymouth. The various lyrics came much later. Wikipedia gives the most well-known.
myridon	Re: River Kwai March	#8	[-]
Posts: 235 Sep 7 06 9:08 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	"The Bridge Over the River Kwai" is a fictional movie released in 1957. By 1957 many "adult" audience members would have been familiar with the insulting lyrics. (I first saw the movie as a child and only knew it as the Comet song.) But... does anyone know if there was any such whistling in either Pierre Boulle's 1952 novel of the same name or real WWII Burmese (Myanmarian?) POW camps? or is it purely an invention of the filmmakers?
jgorman64	Re: River Kwai March	#9	[-]
Posts: 3698 Sep 7 06 9:43 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	According to IMDB, it was British Actor, Percy Herbert, who suggested the use of "Colonel Bogey March" to the director, David Lean. That makes sense since Boulle was French and spoke little English (which set up a controversy as to whom to award the Academy award). edit: too many "tos"
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jgorman64	Re: River Kwai March	#10	[-]
Posts: 3698 Sep 7 06 5:46 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	In many armies, for example the French, it's normal for soldiers to be ordered to sing on the march or during training runs, but in the British Army it isn't. In my basic training unit (where most of the marching and chanting goes on) there were several variants. Some quite clever. My favorite was a black drill sargeant who marched us to "Bo Diddly." It was (as they all were) a call and answer sort of thing. Also on "Goebels has no balls," I think it was on Wikipedia where it was pointed out that the British Soldiers would have, perhaps deliberately, mispronounced the name of the Propaganda Minister as Go-Balls. That scans marvelously.
24450239	Re: River Kwai March	#11	[-]
Posts: 37 Sep 8 06 12:14 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The words suggest they are sung to the tune of 'Do ye ken John Peel?'... http://ingeb.org/songs/johnpeel.html
Syntinen Laulu	Re: River Kwai March	#12	[-]
Posts: 391 Sep 8 06 7:58 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	*Quote:* The words suggest they are sung to the tune of 'Do ye ken John Peel?' The "bollocks in a rat-trap" words? No, it's certainly not the tune of John Peel.
larrysommers(d)	Re: River Kwai March	#13	[-]
Posts: 223 Sep 15 06 11:48 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I believe all variants, clean and unclean, of that are sung to "Turkey in the Straw."
Dr Techie	Re: River Kwai March	#14	[-]
Posts: 9773 Sep 15 06 11:56 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	(never mind)
.	Re: River Kwai March	#15	[-]
Posts: 1376 Sep 18 06 12:00 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Another famous march to which rude words were sung (doubtless by marching soldiers) is "Blaze Away" (1901) by Abe Holtzmann: Ain't it a pity she's only one titty to bang against the wall, Pity her brother, the poor little bugger, he's only got one ball, Ain't it a pity she's only one titty to feed the baby on, And with that, she feeds the cat, so what's the poor bugger live on? This is a brilliant march in very quick time --- great vocal agility is required to sing the words coherently. When one is inebriated, it's almost impossible. Internet sources say the march was composed to celebrate Theodore Roosevelt's charge up San Juan Hill with the "Rough Riders".
gayspiritwarrior	Re: River Kwai March	#16	[-]
Posts: 1 Sep 21 06 2:58 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	>That makes sense since Boulle was French and spoke little English (which set up a controversy as to whom to award the Academy award.< The Oscar was mis-awarded anyway. Michael Wilson and Carl Foreman wrote the screenplay, but weren't given screen credit because they were part of the blacklisted Hollywood Ten. They were both given posthumous Oscars sometime in the 80's.
BlackGrey	Re: River Kwai March	#17	[-]
Posts: 180 Sep 24 06 1:06 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Footnote: The guy who wrote the music for the film just died: Composer Sir Malcolm Arnold dies Apparently, he wrote the complete score in just ten days and ended up winning an Oscar for it. Now that's efficient!
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