“Home! Sweet Home!”

Description

"'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam, Be it ever so humble there's no place like home." The singer yearns to return to that "lowly thatched cottage" which brings peace of mind

Notes

Krythe gives extensive notes on the career of John Howard Payne (1791-1852), actor, playwright, poet, minor American diplomat, expatriate, and man with absolutely no idea how to manage his affairs. This song was originally part of an operetta, "Clari, the Maid of Milan," which Payne sold for fifty pounds in 1823.

The music to the opera "Clari" was by Henry Rowley Bishop. Some have questioned, however, whether he wrote the music for this particular song. It has been claimed that it is an old French tune.

The sheet music sold hundreds of thousands of copies, but of course none of the proceeds went to the composers. - RBW

Broadside LOCSinging as105460: J. Andrews dating per _Studying Nineteenth-Century Popular Song_ by Paul Charosh in American Music, Winter 1997, Vol 15.4, Table 1, available at FindArticles site. - BS

Cross references

• cf. "There Is No Place in the Height of Heaven" (floating lyrics)
• cf. "The Song That Reached My Heart" (recalls this song)

Broadsides

• Bodleian, Firth b.28(7a/b) View 7 of 8, "Home, Sweet Home" ("Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam"), R. March and Co. (London), 1877-1884; also Harding B 25(854), Harding B 11(1564), Firth c.17(40), Harding B 11(2341), Harding B 11(4032), "Home, Sweet Home"
• LOCSheet, sm1851 490710, "Home, Sweet Home" ("'Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam"), Firth, Pond and Co. (New York), 1851; also sm1851 670130, sm1852 510930, sm1852 692100, sm1883 17251, sm1883 21656, "Home, Sweet Home" (tune)
• LOCSinging, as105460, "Home, Sweet Home," J. Andrews (New York), 1853-1859; also sb20169b, "Home, Sweet Home"

Recordings

• The Breaux Freres, "Home Sweet Home" [in Cajun French] (Vocalion 2961B, 1934; on AAFM2)
• Elizabeth Cotten, "Home Sweet Home" (on Cotten03)
• Edward Franklin, "Home Sweet Home" (Columbia 44, 1901)
• Frank Jenkins, "Home Sweet Home" (Silvertone 5080, 1927)
• Lester McFarland & Robert Gardner, "Home Sweet Home" (Brunswick 475, 1930)
• Margarethe Matzenauer, "Home, Sweet Home" (Pathe Actuelle 027519, n.d.)
• McMichen's Melody Men, "Home Sweet Home" (Columbia 15288-D, 1928)
• Royal Hawaiians, "Home Sweet Home" (Broadway 8100, c. 1930)
• DaCosta Woltz's Southern Broadcasters, "Home Sweet Home" (Supertone 9162, 1928)

References

1. RJackson-19CPop, pp. 80-82, "Home! Sweet Home!" (1 text, 1 tune)
2. Dean, p. 120, "Home, Sweet Home" (1 text)
3. Gilbert, p. 87, (no name; a partial text of a parody)
4. Krythe 3, pp. 40-61, "Home, Sweet Home" (1 text, 1 tune)
5. Silber-FSWB, p. 254, "Home, Sweet Home" (1 text)
6. Fuld-WFM, pp. 274-275, "Home! Sweet Home!"
7. DT, HOMSWEET
8. Roud #9597
9. BI, RJ19080