Peggy March (born Margaret Annemarie Battavio on March 8, 1948, Lansdale, P… Read Full Bio ↴Peggy March (born Margaret Annemarie Battavio on March 8, 1948, Lansdale, Pennsylvania) is an American pop music singer. She was discovered at age thirteen singing at a wedding and was introduced to the record producer duo Hugo & Luigi. They gave her the nickname Little Peggy March because of her 4'10" height, the fact that she was thirteen, the first record she did with them was "Little Me", and her birthdate was in March.

In April 1963, her single "I Will Follow Him" had soared to number one on U.S. charts. Recorded in early January 1963 and released January 22 of that year, it made Peggy March the youngest female singer with a number one hit at age fifteen. The record also took the number one spot in Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and Scandinavia.

Her success also came with financial trouble. March was a minor and the Coogan Law prevented her parents from managing her money. The responsibility was placed on her manager, Russell Smith. It was discovered in 1966 that he had squandered the fortune away, leaving her with $500. Peggy graduated from Lansdale Catholic High School in 1966. She soon had a new manager, Arnie Harris, who became her husband and gave her one daughter, Sande, born in 1974.

Though she is remembered by some as a one-hit wonder, her singles "I Wish I Were a Princess" and "Hello Heartache, Goodbye Love" made the Top 30 in the United States and the United Kingdom. She began making a very strong presence in the European and Asian music markets, and she moved to Germany around 1969. Her commercial success in Germany continued through much of the 1970s. In 1979 she experimented with disco on the album, Electrifying, but it failed to achieve commercial success. By 1981 record companies did not renew her contracts, and she moved back to the United States. A retro fad in Germany brought her some continuing success starting in the mid-1990s. Her song "I Will Follow Him" largely inspired the beat in the Eminem and Dr. Dre song Guilty Conscience, and was also featured in the 1992 movie Sister Act. Currently she works largely in the Las Vegas music scene.

Fly Away Pretty Flamingo
Peggy March Lyrics

Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴

Regen fällt auf den Strand
kalter Wind weht ins Land
und mir scheint als wär nie Sommer gewesen
wie verlassen und leer
ist die Welt um mich her
gestern noch war hier nur Sonnenschein

Refr.:

Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
in den Sonnenschein
Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
denn hin zu ihm
möcht ich gern mit euch ziehn

All die Sehnsucht in mir
bringt die Bilder von dir
und ich seh dich noch beim Abschied weinen
doch das Meer kommt zum Strand
und das ist wie ein Pfand
bald kommst du zurück in dieses Land

Refr.:
Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
in den Sonnenschein
Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
denn hin zu ihm

würd' ich gern mit euch ziehn

Refr.:
Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
in den Sonnenschein
Fly, Fly away
fly to my love
oh my pretty flamingos
denn hin zu ihm
möcht ich gern mit euch ziehn

Overall Meaning

The opening lines of Peggy March's Fly Away Pretty Flamingo set the stage for a feeling of emptiness and longing. Rain falls on the beach, and the cold wind blows in from the land. The singer feels as though summer never happened, and the world around her seems deserted and barren. This emptiness is made more explicit in the next lines as the singer notes how only yesterday the sun was shining brightly. All of this sets the tone for the chorus as the singer urges the pretty flamingos to fly away to her love, so they can bask in the sunshine together.

The imagery in the song is quite powerful as the singer gives voice to the yearning in her heart. The pictures of her love, who is absent and makes her feel lonely, are conjured up in her mind's eye. And when the sea meets the shore, it feels like a promise that soon her love will return. This hope is reinforced in the chorus, as the singer asks the pretty flamingos to fly with her to her lover.

In summary, the song tells of a love that is both absent and yearned-for, and it bears an atmosphere of wistfulness and emptiness that is only alleviated by hopes of a future reunion.

Line by Line Meaning

Regen fällt auf den Strand
Rain falls on the beach

kalter Wind weht ins Land
Cold wind blows into the land

und mir scheint als wär nie Sommer gewesen
And it seems to me as if summer has never happened

wie verlassen und leer
How abandoned and empty

ist die Welt um mich her
The world around me is

gestern noch war hier nur Sonnenschein
Only sunshine was here yesterday

Refr.:
Chorus:

Fly, Fly away
Fly, fly away

fly to my love
Fly to my love

oh my pretty flamingos
Oh my pretty flamingos

in den Sonnenschein
Into the sunshine