The most popular type of popular song is, of course, the love song and I’d like to illustrate several subspecies of this form this evening. First of all, the type of love song where the fellow tells the girl that, although the years ahead will almost certainly destroy every vestige of her already dubious charms - that, nonetheless, his love for her will shine on forever through the years, you know. Another example of stark realism in the popular song. This particular example is called “When You Are Old and Grey” and I’d like to dedicate it to anyone in the audience who is still in love with each other.

Since I still appreciate you,
Let’s find love while we may,
Because I know I’ll hate you
When you are old and grey.
So say you love me here and now,
I’ll make the most of that.
Say you love and trust me,
For I know you’ll disgust me
When you are old and getting fat. 

An awful debility, a lessened utility,
A loss of mobility is a strong possibility,
In all probability I’ll lose my virility
And you your fertility and desirability,
And this liability of total sterility
Will lead to hostility and a sense of futility.
So let’s act with agility
While we still have facility
For we’ll soon reach senility
And lose the ability. 

Your teeth will start to go, dear,
Your waist will start to spread.
In twenty years or so, dear,
I’ll wish that you were dead.
I’ll never love you then at all
The way I do today.
So please remember,
When I leave in December, I told you so in May.            Tom Lehrer (1952/53), from his record “Tom Lehrer Revisited”

Admittedly, not a very pleasant song. So if anybody feels offended by Tom Lehrer’s somewhat macabre “lyrics”, what about playing the good old Beatles classic “When I'm Sixty-Four”?                                                                                                       see: www.wiw.org./~drz/tom.lehrer/jmazner/lehrhtml.html                                                                        
                       

ANNOTATIONS: 

subspecies ...............................................…..... Spielart, Abart, Ausprägung
vestige ~ trace …………………………………  Spur  [cf. Latin “vestigium“: to investigate, investigation, investigator etc.]
dubious ~ doubtful ..........………….......………   zweifelhaft
nonetheless......................................................   nichts desto weniger, trotzdem
stark ….......................................................…   (hier) krass
to appreciate ……............................................   schätzen, zu würdigen wissen
if somebody’s waist spreads, he or she is putting on weight
(The meaning of the words ending in “-ility” should be fairly obvious!)

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