Music that makes you cry (warning: leave your machismo at the door)

[Rick Nebiolo]

I never really understood the meaning of this song (and it's many variants) until now. Thanks for the post.

There are clips on youtube including the Eric Bogle version and this equally great Clancey Brothers version. Both are worth a listen/view.

Another version was used in the film "On the Beach". Also Check out "Gallipoli" if you get a chance. No "Waltzing Matilda" but it's essentially what the song is about.

~ Rick

PS I may cry later [img]/images/graemlins/frown.gif[/img]

[fyodor]

I have a couple versions of the Pogues doing Waltzing Maltida, and yes it's made me cry more than once.

[fyodor]

The Pogues - Waltzing Matilda I just cried again

[KilgoreTrout]

The Requiem, particularly the Rex Tremendae. Sublime lamentation.

Though I'm not a religious man, this whole piece moves me. I recall listening to it shortly after the WTC fell. The opening verse weighed heavy:

Requiem aeternam dona ets, Domine,
et lux perpetua luceat ets.

I try to listen to it around the anniversary of my father's death each year. Catharsis, I guess.

[Sniper]

Have you forgotten?

God Bless the USA

[Sniper]

[ QUOTE ]
Have you forgotten?

God Bless the USA

[/ QUOTE ]

While I'm on the theme, this video is very difficult to watch...

[Chump Change]

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I would ask a question that most 2p2ers (especially BBV) are apt to ridicule

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lol queer. JK LDO


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Oh Danny Boy by any fine Irish tenor.



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This is what immediately came to mind, though as a close second to a bagpipe rendition.

Interesting pick, Number, since bagpipes are so strange in that people either love them or hate them, and once your mind is made up not single piece of music changes it. Ah well, they're missing out.


There aren't any songs that make me cry at every listen though there are many that have at different points in my life, for various reasons. I was trying to compile a list in my head:

"O Holy Night' is one that always gets me. The part that goes,

Fall upon your knees
Oh hear the angel's voices
Oh night divine
Oh night, when christ was born

Is one of the most powerful musical phrases i've ever heard.

"Round here" by the Counting Crows is another, when I first heard it at a somewhat tumultuous point in my life.

"Hide and seek" by Imogen Heap.

"Midnight train to Georgia" by Gladys Knight and the Pips.

"Salisbury Hill" by Peter Gabriel.

And since everybody is posting lyrics, this is one aptly titled "Cry if you want to" by The Holly Cole Trio:


Cry if you want
I wont tell you not to
I won’t try to cheer you up
Ill just be here if you want me

It’s no use in keeping a stiff upper lip
You can weep you can sleep you can loosen your grip
You can frown you can drown and go down with the ship
You cry if you want to
Don’t ever apologize venting your pain
Its something to me you don’t need to explain
I don’t need to know why
I don’t think it’s insane
You can cry if you want to

The windows are closed
The neighbors aren’t home
If it’s better with me than to do it alone
Ills draw all the curtains and unplug the phone
You can cry if you want

You can stare at the ceiling and tear at your hair
Swallow your feelings and stager and swear
You could show things and throw things and I wouldn’t care
You can cry if you want to

I won’t make fun of you
I won’t tell any one
I won’t analyze what you do or you should have done
I won’t advise you to go and have fun
You can cry if you want to

Well it’s empty and ugly and terribly sad
I can’t feel what you feel but I no it feel bad
I no that its real and it makes you so mad
You could cry

Cry if you want to I won’t tell you not to
I won’t try and cheer you up
Ill just be here if you want me; to be
Near you

[Number27]

[ QUOTE ]

Fall upon your knees
Oh hear the angel's voices
Oh night divine
Oh night, when christ was born

[/ QUOTE ]

When done solo by someone with a powerful voice, this line turns in me into a blabberin baby every time.

[KilgoreTrout]

[ QUOTE ]
Now I know most will never have heard this.

The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

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Are you serious? That song is older than dirt. My grandfather had a Clancy Brothers version of it that I remember as a kid. It's a folk song. Been recorded hundreds of times.

For historical context, watch Gallipoli.

[Stagger_Lee]

Just don't confuse it with the poem "Waltzing Matilda" by Banjo Patterson. This is also sung - usually at Wallabies rugby matches.

Waltzing Matilda is about a swagman who steals a sheep & jumps to his death rather than be taken alive.

The Band Played Waltzing Matilda is an anti-war song that references the poem.

I am surprised that so many know it & also that the movie Gallipoli rated a couple of mentions as well. I thought both would be very Aussie-centric. There is what amounts to an Aussie pilgramage to the beaches at Gallipoli each year for the Anzac Day dawn service.