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July 04, 2008
Happy Birthday to Us
I wanted to celebrate the fourth of July by posting a video of the national anthem. After a search of YouTube, I have come to agree with Ken Levine - there aren't a lot of good versions out there.. The best version I found was played by the British at Buckingham Palace. How's that for irony? Far too many people try to over-sing or put their own stamp on the anthem.
Levine's thoughts on the national anthem are also posted at the Huffington Post, which had some interesting comments. I tend to agree that the "Star Spangled Banner" is a rather unwieldy and hard to sing anthem. Still, I prefer it to "America the Beautiful," a song that has been suggested as a replacement. While "America" contains some beautiful imagery, the commonly-sung lyrics don't adequately capture the sense of sacrifice central to this country's founding history.
Still, "America the Beautiful" would make a much better anthem than another song suggested - "This Land is Your Land" by Woody Guthrie. I've never understood the appeal of that insipid little tune - if we're going to go for the simplistic kindergarten-level message, we might as well make "Yankee Doodle" our anthem.
Of course, I may not be the best judge of such things since I believe the most majestic national anthem I've heard is that of the former Soviet Union.
Posted by slublog at July 4, 2008 12:00 AM
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Comments
I have always liked the French version of the Canadian anthem, but I can't find a good YouTube of that either.
Posted by: MainiacJoe at July 4, 2008 12:26 AM
"The best version I found was played by the British at Buckingham Palace. How's that for irony?"
THAT WOULD PROBABLY BE BECAUSE THE TUNE TO OUR COUNTRY'S ANTHEM ORIGINATED IN ENGLISH PUBS AS A DRINKING DIDDY AND THEY HAVE BEEN SINGING TO THE TUNE FOR HUNDREDS OF YEARS LONGER THAN US....
Posted by: Anonymous at July 11, 2008 05:01 PM