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1971 song

"And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" is a song written by Scottish born Australian singer songwriter Eric Bogle in 1971. The song describes war as futile and gruesome, while criticising those who seek to glorify it. This is exemplified in the song by the account of a young Australian serviceman who is maimed during the Gallipoli Campaign of the First World War. The protagonist, who had travelled across rural Australia before the war, is emotionally devastated by the loss of his legs in battle. As the years pass he notes the death of other veterans, while the younger generation becomes apathetic to the veterans and their cause. At its conclusion, the song incorporates the melody and a few lines of lyrics of the 1895 song "Waltzing Matilda" by Australian poet Banjo Paterson. Many cover versions of the song have been performed and recorded, as well as many versions in foreign languages.

The song is an account of the memories of an old Australian man who, as a youngster, had travelled across rural Australia as a swagman, "waltzing [his] Matilda" (carrying his "swag", a combination of portable sleeping gear and luggage) all over the bush and Outback. In 1915, he joined the Australian armed forces and was sent to Gallipoli. For "ten weary weeks", he kept himself alive as "around [him] the corpses piled higher". Eventually, he is wounded by a shell burst and awakens in hospital to find that he has lost his legs. He declares it to be a fate worse than death, as he can "go no more waltzing Matilda". When the ship carrying the young soldiers had left Australia, the band played "Waltzing Matilda" while crowds waved flags and cheered. When the crippled narrator returns and "the legless, the armless, the blind, the insane" are carried down the gangway to the same popular music, the people watch in silence and turn their faces away. As an old man, he now watches his comrades march in Anzac Day parades from his porch. As the war falls out of living memory, young people question the purpose of the observances, and he finds himself doing the same. With each passing year, the parades become smaller, as "more old men disappear", and he observes that "some day, no one will march there at all".

The first release of the song was by John Currie on the Australian label M7 in 1975. The Sands Family, the Skids, John Williamson, The Bushwackers and the bluegrass band Kruger Brothers, Redgum, John Schumann, Tickawinda (on the album Rosemary Lane), Orthodox Celts, The Houghton Weavers, The Pogues and Bread and Roses. Audrey Auld Mezera (on the album Billabong Song), Garrison Keillor has also performed it on his radio show A Prairie Home Companion when ANZAC Day (25 April) has fallen on a Saturday and has also performed his own adaptation titled And the Band Played The Star Spangled Banner. Phil Coulter released a cover on his 2007 album Timeless Tranquility 20 Year Celebration. American Vietnam veteran and Medal of Honor recipient Senator Bob Kerrey, who lost half his leg in the war, sang the song to his supporters after being elected to the United States Senate in 1988, and borrowed the first line for the title of his 2002 autobiography, When I Was A Young Man: A Memoir.

In 1986 the song was given a Gold Award 1986 by the Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA). In May 2001 the APRA, as part of its 75th Anniversary celebrations, named "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" as one of the Top 30 Australian songs of all time.