Ernest Hastings

Ernest Walter Hastings (15 June 1879 – 2 September 1940) was an English singer, pianist, composer and performer of comic monologues. He was popular from the 1900s to the 1930s, when he was described as "England's Greatest Entertainer at the Piano".

In the First World War, he performed songs both in support of recruitment, such as "We're All Plain Civilians" (with lyrics by Foden Williams, 1914), The song was very well received, with lyrics such as: "How dare your husband die!/ He was A1 in July/ What say ma'am? He's in heaven now?/ Well you just let him know/ I'm sending a Sergeant to fetch him back/ For of course he's got to go!". His other songs and monologues included "The Bolshevik" (written by Lee and Weston, 1919), and "Seaside Posters Round the Home" (by Edgar Bateman and Henry E. Pether, 1919).

From 1914 until 1929, he made recordings for the Columbia and His Master's Voice record labels. These included "A Soldier's Reminiscences" (with lyrics by Bert Lee, 1914); the earliest recording of Lee and Weston's song "My Word, You Do Look Queer" (1922, later popularised by Stanley Holloway); and the tribute to Woolworth's stores, "There's Nothing Over Sixpence in the Store" (with lyrics by Frank S Wilcock, 1927), and "The Nut Brown Ale of England" (with lyrics by Percy Beck, 1931). Hastings appeared in the 1919 Royal Variety Performance, and toured the vaudeville circuit in Australia in 1925 with J. Milton Hayes. He also made BBC radio broadcasts in the late 1920s.

Hastings died in Willesden, London, in 1940, aged 61.