Happy St. Patrick's Day

Another St. Patrick's Day annual tradition -- and for decades, by the way, long before the Internet thing -- this is the song, "Ring to the Name of Rose," performed here by a school glee club.

Now, I know that on the surface it appears that I'm posting this because of its connection to the Irish Rose.  And that's a good theory, and a reasonable connection.  And it holds, but then, if that was solely the case I'd probably instead post the song, "My Wild Irish Rose."  In fact, I'm posting it because today, St. Patrick's Day, is the birthday of my grandmother -- and her name was Rose.

Family history dating back to 1895 being what it is, there's an uncertainty if there was any St. Patrick's Day connection to my grandmother being named Rose because of the day.  The general assumption is "no," but that's not a sure thing.  However, what is sure is that my grandmother absolutely loved being born on St. Patrick's Day, and the connection that her name was Rose.  So, that's good enough for me.

By the way, there's another interesting thing about this song -- who wrote it.  It's a lovely, sweet number, and not remotely the kind of song we associate with the loud, boisterous work of its composer-lyricist -- best known for "You're a Grand Old Flag," "I'm a Yankee Doodle Dandy" and "Give My Regards to Broadway."  That would, of course, be George M. Cohan.

And okay, as long as we're noting George M. Cohan, here's a bonus.  It's a medley from the Broadway musical George M!, which starred Joel Grey and featured a score that was made up of Cohan's songs, including in this sequence of little-known Cohan numbers today's song of honor.

(Note: despite what the person posting this below writes, that is not Bernadette Peters in the first song.  She was in the show, as Cohan's younger sister Josie, but this first singer is Jill O'Hara, whose character Agnes Nolan becomes Cohan's second wife -- only a few months later, O'Hara -- a fine name of St. Patrick's Day -- graduated to starring in the musical Promises, Promises, and with Jerry Orbach introduced the hit song, "What Do You Get When You Fall in Love?"
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