Flanders and Swann were a British comedy duo. Lyricist, actor and singer Michael Flanders and composer and pianist Donald Swann collaborated in writing and performing comic songs. They first worked together in a school revue in 1939 and eventually wrote more than 100 comic songs together. Between 1956 and 1967, Flanders and Swann performed their songs, interspersed with comic monologues, in their long-running two-man revues At the Drop of a Hat and At the Drop of Another Hat, which they toured in Britain and abroad. Both revues were recorded in concert, and the duo also made several studio recordings.
Musical partnership
Flanders and Swann both attended Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford, two institutions linked by ancient tradition. The pair went their separate ways during World War II, but a chance meeting in 1948 led to a musical partnership writing songs and light opera, Flanders providing the words and Swann composing the music. Their songs have been sung by performers such as Ian Wallace and Joyce Grenfell. In December 1956, Flanders and Swann hired the New Lindsey Theatre, Notting Hill, to perform their own two-man revue At the Drop of a Hat, which opened on New Year's Eve. Flanders sang a selection of the songs that they had written, interspersed with comic monologues, accompanied by Swann on the piano. An unusual feature of their act was that both men remained seated for their shows: Swann behind his piano and Flanders in a wheelchair. The show was successful and transferred the next month to the Fortune Theatre, where it ran for over two years, before touring in the UK, the United States, Canada and Switzerland. In 1963, Flanders and Swann opened in a second revue, At the Drop of Another Hat, at the Haymarket Theatre. Over the next four years they toured a combination of the two shows in the UK, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, the United States and Canada, before finishing at the Booth Theatre on Broadway. On 9 April 1967, they performed their last live show together. Ten days later, they moved into a studio and recorded the show for television. Over the course of 11 years, Flanders and Swann gave nearly 2,000 live performances. Although their performing partnership ended in 1967, they remained friends afterwards and collaborated on occasional projects.
Timeline and venues of the revues
Discography
Their records were originally released on the Parlophone label; CD reissues are on EMI.
Flanders and Swann's songs are characterised by wit, gentle satire, complex rhyming schemes, and memorable choruses. Flanders commented during the recorded performance of At the Drop of Another Hat, They wrote over a hundred comic songs together. The following selection gives an indication of their range. A very rare song, "Vendor Librorum Floreat", was released as a single in 1960. It was written for the annual American Booksellers Association, the only known time Flanders & Swann accepted a private commission.
Monologues
Flanders' comic monologues include:
"By Air"—about the vogue for air travel. "I agree with the old lady who said, 'If God had intended us to fly, He would never have given us the railways.
"Tried by the Centre Court"—a Wimbledon match between Miss L. Hammerfest and Miss Joan Hunter-Dunn. "They are bashing a ball with the gut of a cat".
"Greensleeves"—about the background to the composition of the famous English air. An annotated version, explaining all the jokes, is available online.
Los Olividados— a satire on bullfighting, about "the almost unbearable drama of a corrida d'olivas, or festival of olive-stuffing". "A cruel sport: some may think it so. But this is surely more than a sport, this is more than a vital artform. What we have experienced here today is total catharsis, in the acting out of that primeval drama, of man pitted against the olive." The title is a reference to Los Olvidados, or The Forgotten Ones, a 1950 movie by the director Luis Buñuel.
"Built-up Area"—a prehistoric inhabitant of Salisbury Plain complains about a new development: Stonehenge.
Homage and parody
The British comedy double actArmstrong & Miller have a recurring sketch on The Armstrong and Miller Show in which they parody Flanders and Swann, as Donald Brabbins and Teddy Fyffe. The parodies begin like a typical Flanders and Swann performance, but the songs are far more bawdy, often being mock-censored for comedic effect. British singer-songwriter Frank Turner covered "The Armadillo" in his "Mittens" EP.
