The Western Brothers - Lord Haw Haw of Zeesen / Bad Show Chaps (1939)

Описание: The Western Brothers were Kenneth Alfred Western (10 September 1899 - 24 January 1963) and (Ernest) George Western (23 July 1895 - 16 August 1969), an English music hall and radio act, who were popular from the 1930s to the late 1950s, performing self-written comic songs, wearing evening dress and monocles.

Although billed as the Western 'Brothers' they were in fact second cousins, and had not even met each other until both were adults soon before forming their act when a family member who knew of both their interests in performing suggested they meet. In the early 1920s George Western was alreading performing at the piano in London for the Roosters Concert Party and Kenneth, who was a Civil Servant, had an interest in writing songs as a hobby. And so Kenneth wrote to George proposing to write songs for which George then arranged the music.

They started performing together professionally in 1925 and at first they performed as 'The Perfectly Polite Pair' before settling on The Western Brothers. Portraying two upper-class characters, their songs lampooned the 'Old School Tie' brigade. Such was their popularity that when they started recording 78s for Columbia, the record label created a special Old School Tie logo for the records, which had a red, white and dark blue striped tie on the labels.

Both George and Kenneth were fond of aviation and George had a Pilots license. Their are a couple of pictures of the boys in their flying gear standing next to planes.

Throughout the 30s they toured theatres, both London and Provincial, appeared in films, released records for Columbia and from 1938 had their own BBC Radio show called Cad's College. Their catchphrase throughout was "Play the Game, you Cads! Play the Game!" which they even voiced at the beginning of the Will Hay film 'Old Bones of the River' (1938) and was so well known by the mid-thirties that even The Crazy Gang did an impression of them in their first feature film 'O-Kay for Sound' (1937) when they're told to get dressed up to play City Gents in a film being made at the local studio Chesney Allen says to the Gang "We must be Old School Tie" and the Crazy Gang reply "Play the Game, You Cads! Play the Game!". The Western Brothers had appeared with The Crazy Gang many times at the London Palladium and were often at the recieving end of the Gang's renowed sense of fun and pranks. On at least one occasion though The Western Brothers got in first;

"When invited to enter Bud Flanagan's dressing room they were drenched with water from a cold tap which the arch-joker had cunningly placed above the door. On the second occasion they were ready for it and it was Bud who got wet because Kenneth and George had surreptitiously arranged for a third party - but they never said who - to drive several holes in the pipework, thus soaking the whole room when Bud turned the tap on!"

In 1935 they made the first of two Royal Variety Command appearances before King George V and Queen Mary. Throughout their peak in the 30s they were pulling in £400 a week from performances, an incredible amount for the time.

Although they made a few appearance on it, the only medium on which they never really took off was TV, which was arguably what finished off their declining careers in the 50s. Although popular Pre-War their gentle mocking songs of Empire and the big names of the day such as Lady Astor and Ministers such as Hoare-Belisha found a ready audience with both the people and High society,and even during the war with such big hits as 'Lord Haw-Haw of Zeesen' which mocked the Nazi propaganda broadcaster, they found that after the War the public considered that Old School Tie mentality to be anachronistic and no longer relevent to British society, with Radio and the new medium of TV tended more towards working class and ordinary people, the likes of Tony Hancock portraying the everyman becoming the norm.

The Western Brothers did carry on performing though, for private parties and theatre work up to 1962, with 20 public appearances that last year.

Kenneth died at the age of 63 in Bedford on 24th January, 1963. He had married Beatrice Florence Crowley on 14 June 1924, at the Christ Church in Islington, London, and had four daughters; Joyce, Jill, Judith and Jane.

After Kenneth's death George retired from entertainment, running a sweet and tobacco kiosk at Weybridge Railway Station until his death in 1969. He died Saturday 16th August, 1969 in Weybridge, aged 74. He had married Irene Lilian Palmer on 21 October, 1922, at the Stroud Green Parish Church in Edmonton, England. They had three children; Pamela, Robert, and Patricia.

For details on the career of The Western Brothers and other acts visit my Vintage British Music-Hall & Variet Comedy website at http://vintagebritishcomedy.webeden.c...