Background
Kennedy was born near Omagh, in Northern Ireland. His father, Joseph Hamilton Kennedy, was a policeman in the Royal Irish Constabulary, which existed before the Partition of Ireland.
Kennedy was born near Omagh, in Northern Ireland. His father, Joseph Hamilton Kennedy, was a policeman in the Royal Irish Constabulary, which existed before the Partition of Ireland.
Kennedy graduated from Trinity College, Dublin, before teaching in England.
While growing up in Coagh, Kennedy wrote several songs and poems. He was inspired by local surroundings—the view of the Ballinderry river, the local Springhill house and the plentiful chestnut trees on his family"s property, as evidenced in his poem chestnut trees. Kennedy later moved to Portstewart, a seaside resort.
Kennedy was accepted into the Colonial Service, as a civil servant, in 1927.
While awaiting a Colonial Service posting to the colony of Nigeria, Kennedy embarked on a career in songwriting by joining the staff of Bert Feldman, a music publisher based in London"s Tin Pan Alley. In a career spanning more than fifty years, he wrote some 2000 songs, of which over 200 became worldwide hits and about 50 are all-time popular music classics.
Until the duo of Lennon and McCartney, Kennedy had more hits in the United States than any other Irish or British songwriter., with original music by Georges Boulanger, had English lyrics penned by Kennedy in 1939.
lieutenant was originally written by Boulanger with the title "Avant de Mourir" in 1926.
His first success came in 1931 with the sung by Gracie Fields. (1935) was inspired by beautiful summer evenings in his native part of the world, and by a holiday picture postcard he received from Tijuana, Mexico. During the early stages of the Second World War, while serving in the British Army"s Royal Artillery, where he rose to the rank of Captain, he wrote the wartime hit.
His hits also include,, (music by John Walter Bratton),, "Hokey Cokey" and
In the 1960s Kennedy wrote the song The Banks of the Erne, for recording by his very good friend from the war years, Theo Hyde. Theo"s professional name was Ray Warren, and this is the name that appears on possibly the only published copy of the sheet music
Kennedy was a patron of the Castlebar International Song Contest from 1973 until his death in 1984 and his association with the event added great prestige to the contest. Kennedy died in Cheltenham on 6 April 1984, aged 81, and was interred in Taunton, Somerset.