ONLY A ROSE
From the Broadway Show "The Vagabond King" (1925)
(Rudolf Friml / Brian Hooker)

Denis King & Carolyn Thomson (stage; first operetta version) - 1925
Denis King & Jeanette MacDonald (first film version) - 1930
Oreste Kirkop & Kathryn Grayson (second film version) - 1956
Oreste Kirkop & Jean Fenn (record version)

Also recorded by:

Carolyn Thomson - 1926
Alfred Drake & Mimi Benzell - 1951
Bette McLaurin - 1953
Mario Lanza & Judith Raskin - 1958

Gordon MacRae & Lucille Norman; Ted Christopher & Julie Wright;
Webster Booth & Anne Ziegler; Charlie Barnet & His Orch.;
Jimmy Dorsey Orch.(with Bob Eberly & Helen O'Connell);
London Promenade Orch.; Doris Vane & Harold Williams;
Earl Wrightson & Lois Hunt; David Whitfield & Shaw; 
Richard Tauber; John Hanson; Richard Crooks; David Garrick.



Oreste Kirkop & Jean Fenn version:


Oreste:
Red rose out of the east
Tell the love I love least. "Who knows?
Red rose out of the west
Tell the love I love best "Love is a rose"

Only a rose I give you.
Only a song dying away,
Only a smile to keep in memory
Until we meet another day.

Only a rose to whisper,
Blushing as roses do,
"I'll bring along a smile or a song for anyone"
Only a rose for you.

Jean:
Only a rose you give me.
Only a song dying away,
Only a smile to keep in memory
Until we meet another day.

Jean: Only a rose to whisper, (Oreste: Only a rose to whisper,)
Jean: Blushing as roses do, (Oreste: Blushing as roses do,)
Jean and Oreste:
"I'll bring along a smile or a song for anyone"
Only a rose for you.



(Contributed by Ferda Dolunay - July 2006)