AFTER THE BALL

AFTER THE


BALL


Almost 100 years before Taylor Swift was born, if you wanted to listen to a good song about heartbreak then you listened to After the Ball. After the Ball was wildly popular in the late 1800's. In the song, an uncle tells his niece why he never married. He saw his sweetheart kissing another man at the ball. He was justifiably mad and refused to listen to her explanation. Many years later, after the woman had died, he learned that the man was her brother.

When I returned, dear, there stood a man

Kissing my sweetheart, as lovers can

Down fell the glass, pet broken, that's all

Just as my heart was after the ball.

I am personally confused at why his sweetheart was kissing her brother passionately enough that the man in the story assumed it was another "lover" of hers. But clearly no one else was concerned with this fact during the time period because the sheet music for After the Ball became the first sheet music in history to sell a million copies.

Even though the story in After the Ball isn't that believable (or maybe it was in 1890) every generation needs a sad song that they can cry too. And while After the Ball is no I will always love you, it's definitely a pretty song that I'm sure thousands of people played on the piano and enjoyed.



Comments

  1. Jamie PerrySeptember 27, 2021 at 10:59 AM

    First off this made me laugh so hard so thank you for that. Also I agree! Everyone always needs a sad song to relate to and I never really thought of this like that until now. And yeah it is super weird that they were kissing like that and no one cared. It is super pretty and I like how it sounds and I understand why everyone liked it. Sometimes it is just good to listen to a sad heartbreak song. Even if it is a super old one.

    ReplyDelete
  2. JrrSeptember 27, 2021 at 11:25 AM

    The story of this song is sad because the man has been hurted by the person he loved. When we try to put our feet in his shoes, it makes us feel terrible.
    But it’s also weird, how and why the woman kissed her brother? Didn’t she really love her man ?

    ReplyDelete
  3. HalleSeptember 27, 2021 at 3:52 PM

    I love the way that you have your blog set up! It is seriously so fun! I also love the way that you can relate these songs to modern songs! I like how you included a bit of history into this blog post and you shared the background! I agree though that it is a little bit wacky and kinda disturbing that it was just normal for this girl to be kissing her brother. Haha!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Alessandra WebbSeptember 28, 2021 at 10:30 AM

    This was so awesome and fun to read!!! It is so weird to think about what people did before our modern music. Because After the Ball isn't quite as enjoyable as some breakup songs now. I really like though that you brought up a super valid question of why she was kissing her brother so passionately. Interesting how no one mentioned that during their time period, and just focused on the music instead.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Dean RiceSeptember 29, 2021 at 1:25 PM

    I did my post about After The Ball too! I think it's so hard to understand or empathize with music this old, for myself at least, because I never really thought about his song as a break up song. And now that you've pointed that out, I find the concept HYSTERICAL.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Richard McAllisterSeptember 29, 2021 at 6:20 PM

    Reading this post and hearing about how the whole story of the song unfolds it gives me a similar feeling to hearing Romeo and Juliet for the first time but not as serious as people dying. While listening to this song I don't quite get the heartbreak or sadness from the sound of the song I can definitely see where you're coming from and how others get the same feeling.

    ReplyDelete

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