Well known Midlands-based singer songwriting trio Mumbo-Jumbo has written a song to celebrate the role of women on the Homefront during WW2 for the VE Day 75 event organisers.
The song, ‘Six Million Women (The Homefront Song)’ is to be a part of the ‘Nation’s Toast to the Heroes of WW2’ taking place throughout the United Kingdom at 3pm on the 8th May 2020, and has been written and recorded by Mumbo-Jumbo and features top folk singer Edwina Hayes.
“We were interested in having a song that celebrated the vital but often under recognised role of women on the Homefront as part of VE Day 75,” said Pageantmaster Bruno Peek LVO OBE OPR. “The song is very catchy and we are inviting events all over the UK to either perform it themselves or play it over the VE Day 75 weekend of 8th – 10th May this year. We also see it forming a part of the media activity.”
“With the impact of Covid 19, all the public events over the VEDay75 weekend have been postponed to coincide with VJ Day 75 in August creating a combined VE/VJ 75 celebration,” he continued. “We hope the song will continue to feature in media coverage on May 8th and the mass playing of it across the country will happen in August.
“It was great to write a song specially for such a major national and international event, and we are looking forward to it being a small cog in a big wheel,” said Oliver Carpenter of Mumbo-Jumbo who will be part of the thousands of activities planned for the weekend. “Focussing on the transformation of the war effort by the movement of women, young and older people into war work, the song also touches on how this permanently evolved the world of work and the role of women, as well as the combination of worry and camaraderie at the time. Getting Edwina Hayes in to sing the song was a really rewarding part of the project.” ‘Six Million Women (The Homefront Song)’ can be found at the VE Day 75 website at www.veday75.org/downloads and downloaded in its complete form, as an instrumental backing track and as musical notation for VE Day 75 events.