Watson's Lullaby

Album: Parade (1998)
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Songfacts®:

  • "Watson's Lullaby" or simply "Lullaby" is a very short song from the musical Parade, which is based on the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan and the resulting trial, conviction and eventual lynching of factory manager Leo Frank for her murder. It is a dedication to the victim, bidding her to sleep with the angels. Like the rest of the score, "Lullaby" was written by Jason Robert Brown. The song is performed in Act I by Tom Watson.

    Thomas Edward Watson (1856-1922) was a Populist politician who would eventually serve as Senator for Georgia, from March 1921 until his death in September the following year. Watson was an at times controversial and some might say enigmatic figure. He called for the recognition of the Ku Klux Klan and supported the enfranchisement of black men; a democrat who advocated agrarian reform, he was also a firm believer in lynching. In August 1915 he published a lengthy article in his own magazine in which he set out an overwhelming case for the guilt of Leo Frank and the innocence of Jim Conley. In the same article he argued that Frank had first attempted to frame Newt Lee, the black security man who found Mary Phagan's body in the basement of the pencil factory. Lee, he said, was arrested primarily on innuendo and evidence generated by Frank, whose sexual advances had been spurned by the victim. >>
    Suggestion credit:
    Alexander Baron - London, England

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