IF YOU COULD ONLY COME WITH ME

(Noël Coward (m & l) 1929)

Lyrics as sung by Nelson Eddy 1940 < Bitter Sweet >

Oh, there may be beauty in this land of yours
Skies are very often dull and grey
If I could but take that little hand of yours
Just to lead you secretly away.

We would watch the Danube as it gently flows
Like a silver ribbon winding free
Even as I speak of it, my longing grows
Once again, my own dear land to see.

If you could only come with me...
If you could only come with me...

NOTES:

Musical film Bitter Sweet 1940
Director: W.S. Van Dyke
Leads: 
Jeanette MacDonald / Nelson Eddy / George Sanders

The film was an adaptation of the English 
playwright Noël Coward's 1929 three act 
operetta by the same name.

MGM promoted the 1940 film as a lavish musical 
romance containing 11 songs and shot it in 
Technicolor unlike it's English predecessor from 
1933. The film Bitter Sweet was released first in 
London March 1933 in B & W (USA B &W in August). 
The London play debuted four years prior to that in 1929. 
It contained only 2 songs, one of which did not make it 
into the later US 1940 creation.

Musical film Bitter Sweet 1933
The London film production was directed by Herbert Wilcox
Leads: Anna Neagle / Fernand Graavey / Miles Mander

Interestingly, Noël Coward purportedly intensely 
disliked the US rendition and stated that no more of 
his work would ever be shot in Hollywood.




(Transcribed by David Story - February 2014)