Earth Song is the better rose, IMHO, and here's why:

1. In a front-to-back, wide rose bed which is 2-3 rose bushes deep you would place Carefree Beauty at the back of the bed if you were graduating bush heights from front to back, right? Wrong! Carefree Beauty has an arching, cascading growth habit, in spite of its ~4' height. The flowers are carried just about to the ground due to the arching growth habit. Most of the bush's flower output will be obscured by the rose bushes in front of it.

As a bush in a single bush wide rose bed or as a stand alone bush, Carefree Beauty will work wonderfully. As a back of bed bush...no!

Earth Song will work excellently at the back of a rose bed, with its 5' height and upright flower presentation.

2. Earth Song's color and flower form is both a richer, deeper, more vibrant pink color and a more elegantly formed flower. Carefree Beauty's flower is very nice, but blousy, and the petals, especially the inner most ones, are disorganized when fully open

3. Fragrance is always subjective (nose by nose), variable from garden to garden, and often bush age related...more mature bushes often push out more fragrant blooms. Carefree Beauty is basically scentless. Earth Song has fragrance.

4. Both bushes can get black spot, in spite of Carefree Beauty's designation as an Earth Kind Rose. Earth Song is the huskier bush. Neither one is going to die out due to a black spot outbreak, but I give the nod to Earth Song for more vigor, and therefore more disease resistance.

Earth Song is harder to find, but well worth the effort.

I agree with Moses' assessment that Earth Song is the better rose. I find that it repeats virtually all summer, whereas Carefree Beauty likes to take a break frequently. The blooms of CB are also looser to my eye, whereas Earth Song keeps its form better. Earth Song tends to be about 4-5' in my yard with mostly surviving cane and CB is smaller with sometimes needing to be pruned to the ground.

Cynthia

I've grown both up north (Z6) and in the south and I'd say it partly depends on the climate. Earth Song has almost columnar growth and can get very at all; Carefree has a shrub habit and is easily twice as wide as tall. They would be beautiful combined in one bed.

That said, here in zone 8A mid-atlantic, I'd give Carefree Beauty the nod. It blooms continuously on all levels of the bush, a true shrub rose. Easy to put in a prominent spot because the foliage is clean here. In the very large gardens I maintain, I appreciate the fact that when it doesn't require constant pruning to keep it to size.

Earth Song is a very tall shrub here and if not pruned energetically the blooms are often above eye level. Lots of summer blackspot, and bloom shuts down during peak heat; the rest of the year it blooms in big flushes. Blooms have a deep rich color and more of a hybrid tea form.

Griffith Buck's three best roses IMHO are Quietness, Carefree Beauty, and Earth Song.

I have 8 Carefree Beauty, I love them, they're my landscaping roses, blooming machines. I think you should get 1 each.

I can't remember if earth song is at cheek wood but they definitely have carefree beauty so you could check it out in person in a few weeks !

Thank you, thank you! This is so helpful. I've actually got all three Buck's on order and arriving soon: Carefree Beauty, Earth Song and Quietness. I'm trying to figure out placement and the "single rose deep bed" vs. the "multiple rose deep bed" is very helpful. I've expanded my gardens and am officially giving up on Teas as I think its just too cold here. Although right after I threatened to shovel prune Mrs. B R Cant for being down to a single cane I find she is sending out 5 basals, so she got a couple of shovels of manure instead. Anyway, lots of new room for roses so I'm trying a few Bucks for disease resistance and those three were the ones I picked.

These three will give you a lovely range of color! I think you'll be so pleased.

Erasmus, your CB is beautiful!!!

Subk3, glad you ordered 3 of them. I just planted 1 grafted Quietness last weekend.