Hard Times Come Again No More

"Hard Times Come Again No More"
"Hard Times Come Again No More"
	1854 sheet music cover
Song
Published	1854
Songwriter(s)	Stephen Foster

"Hard Times Come Again No More" (sometimes, "Hard Times") is an American parlor song written by Stephen Foster. It was published in New York City by Firth, Pond & Co. in 1854 as Foster's Melodies No. 28. Well-known and popular in its day,^[1] both in the United States and Europe,^[2]^[3] the song asks the fortunate to consider the plight of the less fortunate and includes one of Foster's favorite images: "a pale drooping maiden".

The first audio recording was a wax cylinder by the Edison Manufacturing Company (Edison Gold Moulded 9120) in 1905.^[4] It has been recorded and performed numerous times since. The song is Roud Folk Song Index #2659.

Released seven years before the American Civil War, it gained great popularity during that conflict as an expression of suffering and hardship, to the point that a satirical version about soldiers' food became widely circulated as well, "Hard Tack Come Again No More".

^ R. J. "The Fields of June". Southern Literary Messenger, vol. XXI, no. 8 (August 1855) Richmond, Virginia, p. 503: "Among these may be mentioned that sad plaintive beautiful melody of Foster's—'Hard times come again no more.' Have you heard it? What an echo of sadness in it! 'Tis the song the sigh of the weary— / Hard time! hard times! / Many days you have lingered / Around my cabin door, / But hard times come again no more!"
^ Sandford, Henry, Mrs. The Girls' Reading-Book. London: W. & R. Chambers (1876), p. 201: "It was in a sewing-school in Lancashire, during the latter part of the Cotton Famine, that the well-known song 'Hard times, hard time, come again no more!' first became familiar to my ears."
^ Hubbard, W. L. (ed.). History of American Music. New York: Irving Squire (1908), p. 80: "Other songs beside those designated as plantation melodies, but all more or less impregnated with sentiment, now came rapidly from his pen and obtained a wide popularity not only in America but in Europe as well. Such songs as ...'Hard Times Come Again No More', ... have become familiar to many nationalities."
^ Campbell, Paul (7 February 2013). "Old music: Stephen Foster – Hard Times (Come Again No More)". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 March 2024.

[1] R. J. "The Fields of June". Southern Literary Messenger, vol. XXI, no. 8 (August 1855) Richmond, Virginia, p. 503: "Among these may be mentioned that sad plaintive beautiful melody of Foster's—'Hard times come again no more.' Have you heard it? What an echo of sadness in it! 'Tis the song the sigh of the weary— / Hard time! hard times! / Many days you have lingered / Around my cabin door, / But hard times come again no more!"

[2] Sandford, Henry, Mrs. The Girls' Reading-Book. London: W. & R. Chambers (1876), p. 201: "It was in a sewing-school in Lancashire, during the latter part of the Cotton Famine, that the well-known song 'Hard times, hard time, come again no more!' first became familiar to my ears."

[3] Hubbard, W. L. (ed.). History of American Music. New York: Irving Squire (1908), p. 80: "Other songs beside those designated as plantation melodies, but all more or less impregnated with sentiment, now came rapidly from his pen and obtained a wide popularity not only in America but in Europe as well. Such songs as ...'Hard Times Come Again No More', ... have become familiar to many nationalities."

[TG-4] Campbell, Paul (7 February 2013). "Old music: Stephen Foster – Hard Times (Come Again No More)". The Guardian. Retrieved 2 March 2024.

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