page_title: Lili Marleen
section_title: Exposure and reception
hierarchical_section_title: Lili Marleen / Exposure and reception
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Electrola EG 6993/ORA 4198-2. Erstaufnahme der Lili Marlen vom 2. August 1939 im Electrola-Studio, Berlin. Von dem Etikett erschienen während des Krieges verschiedene Varianten. Bei den ältesten wird noch der eigentliche Liedtitel Lied eines jungen Wachtpostens an erster Stelle genannt. English: Electrola EC 6993/ORA 4198-2. First recording of Lili Marlen, 2. August 1939, Electrola Studio, Berlin. Label of one of the different variants that appeared during the war. The oldest label shows that the original song title was first called Song of a young sentry. Français&#160;: Electrola CE 6993/ORA 4198-2. De premier accueil de la Lili Marlen, 2 août 1939. Italiano: Electrola CE 6993/ORA 4198-2. Prima di registrazione di Lilli Marlen, 2 agosto 1939, Electrola Studio, Berlino. L'etichetta ha subito varianti nelle varie edizioni durante la guerra. In una delle prime edizione è stato anche usato il titolo di Canzone di una giovane sentinella. Română: Prima înregistrare a Lilli Marlen, 2 august 1939, Electrola Studio, Berlin. 日本語: 1939年からドイツのレコード Ελληνικά: Πρώτη εγγραφή του Lili Marlen, 2 Αυγούστου 1939, - Electrola Studio, Βερολίνο
context_page_description: "Lili Marleen" is a German love song which became popular during World War II throughout Europe and the Mediterranean among both Axis and Allied troops. Written in 1915 as a poem, the song was published in 1937 and was first recorded by Lale Andersen in 1939 as "Das Mädchen unter der Laterne".
  In 2005, Bear Family Records released a 7-CD set Lili Marleen an allen Fronten, including nearly 200 versions of "Lili Marleen" with a 180-page booklet.
context_section_description: After the occupation of Belgrade in 1941, Radio Belgrade became the German forces' radio station under the name of Soldatensender Belgrad (Soldiers' Radio Belgrade), with transmissions heard throughout Europe and the Mediterranean.
  While on leave in Vienna, a lieutenant working at the station was asked to collect a pile of second-hand records from the Reich radio station. Among them was "Lili Marleen" sung by Lale Andersen, which up till then had sold around 700 copies. Karl-Heinz Reintgen, the German officer in charge of the station, began playing the song on the air. For lack of other recordings, Radio Belgrade played the song frequently.
  At one point the Nazi government's propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, ordered broadcasting of the song to stop. Radio Belgrade received letters from Axis soldiers all over Europe asking them to play "Lili Marleen" again. Erwin Rommel, commander of the Afrika Korps, admired the song and asked Radio Belgrade to incorporate it into their broadcasts.  Goebbels reluctantly changed his mind, and from then on the tune was used to sign-off the broadcast at 9:55 p.m.
  The song was published in South Africa, in a wartime leaflet, with an anonymous English translation, as "Lili Marleen: The Theme Song of the Eighth Army and the 6th Armoured Division".
  Lale Andersen was awarded a gold disc for over one million sales (HMV - EG 6993). It is thought she was awarded her copy after hostilities ended. HMV's copy was discarded during renovations to their Oxford Street store in the 1960s, but the disc was recovered and is now in a private collection.
  Many Allied soldiers made a point of listening to the song at the end of the day. For example, in his memoir Eastern Approaches, Fitzroy Maclean describes the song's effect in the spring of 1942 during the Western Desert Campaign: "Husky, sensuous, nostalgic, sugar-sweet, her voice seemed to reach out to you, as she lingered over the catchy tune, the sickly sentimental words. Belgrade... The continent of Europe seemed a long way away. I wondered when I would see it again and what it would be like by the time we got there."
  The next year, parachuted into the Yugoslav guerrilla war, Maclean wrote: "Sometimes at night, before going to sleep, we would turn on our receiving set and listen to Radio Belgrade. For months now, the flower of the Afrika Korps had been languishing behind the barbed wire of Allied prison camps.  But still, punctually at ten o'clock, came Lale Andersen singing their special song, with the same unvarying, heart-rending sweetness that we knew so well from the desert. [...] Belgrade was still remote. But, now [...] it had become our ultimate goal, which Lili Marlene and her nostalgic little tune seemed somehow to symbolise."
  In the autumn of 1944, the liberation of Belgrade seemed not far away. "Then, at ten o'clock, loud and clear, Radio Belgrade; Lili Marlene, sweet, insidious, melancholy. 'Not much longer now,' we would say, as we switched it off." As the Red Army was advancing on Belgrade, he reflected again on the song. "At Valjevo, as at so many other places [...] we would tune our wireless sets in the evening to Radio Belgrade, and night after night, always at the same time, would come, throbbing lingeringly over the ether, the cheap, sugary and almost painfully nostalgic melody, the sex-laden, intimate, heart-rending accents of Lili Marlene. 'Not gone yet,' we would say to each other. 'I wonder if we'll find her when we get there.' Then one evening at the accustomed time there was silence. 'Gone away,' we said."
  Allied soldiers in Italy later adapted the tune to their own lyrics, creating the "D-Day Dodgers" song.  A cartoon by Bill Mauldin in the American army newspaper Stars and Stripes shows two soldiers in a foxhole, one playing a harmonica, while the other comments, "The krauts ain't following ya too good on 'Lili Marlene' tonight, Joe. Think somethin' happened to their tenor?"
caption: First recording of Lili Marlen, dated 2 August 1939, by Electrola Studio, Berlin. Label of one of the different variants that appeared during the war. The oldest label shows that the original song title was first called "Song of a Young Sentry".
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