Super-special July 4 post!!!!
For July 4, we turn our attention away from picnics, fireworks, and holiday sales. People, we've got a national identity crisis with our national anthem. According to a Harris poll, two thirds of Americans don't know all the words to "The Star-Spangled Banner." I know what you're thinking: "What're you talking about? Everyone knows the words to that song! We've been hearing it and singing it since elementary school. It's sung before every baseball game. Besides, it's only eight lines long, so how can you not have it committed to memory by the time you're twelve?"
Um...erm...only eight lines long? Not quite. In fact, the original song consists of four verses of eight lines each--32 lines total. And while most people do indeed have Verse 1 committed to memory, Verses 2-4 are never sung and remain unknown to most Americans.
For the record, the complete lyrics to "The Star Spangled Banner" are as follows:
A complete history of "The Star Spangled Banner" can be found here.
Okay, you can see why most people stick with the first verse.
"As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses"? Sounds like a tongue twister in the making.
"Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps' pollution"? Mixed metaphor alert! Mixed metaphor alert!
"No refuge could save the hireling and slave"? Uhhhhhh...let's just say this lyric reflects the time period its composer lived in and leave it that, okay? And avoid singing it anywhere above 125th Street in Manhattan.
The National Anthem Project, founded by patriotic music teachers, aims to teach kids about the song's history--goofy mixed metaphors and all.
The other main challenge--aside from memorizing the lines about footsteps causing pollution--is actually singing the song. This is harder than it looks because "The Star Spangled Banner" is a song of swoops and dips, one that even professional opera singers have difficulty mastering, and if you're an untrained singer with a voice like an out-of-tune foghorn, you'll be struggling with the melody and hoping your voice won't give out. (Of course, if you're really such a lousy singer, you'll never be called upon to sing at any public anyway.)
As a spokesman for the National Anthem Project puts it: "It is a very challenging song, you are right about that. But that is why we want music teachers helping young people deal with it." Just think, one of the kids they're reaching could become the next Whitney Houston, belting out the national anthem in the midst of a sporting event, thus helping to lift the national spirit during a time of war.
Conversely, they could also become the next Carl Lewis or Roseanne Barr--celebrities who botched the song. Barr's then-spouse, Tom Arnold, defended her, saying, "Most people can't sing the song. She represented those people. She sang her heart out." Carl Lewis, who was actually trying for a singing career at one point, simply--what's a good word to use here?--overreached. Yeah, that's it.
Periodically, people have suggested replacing the national anthem with another one--a song easier on the vocal cords but no less patriotic. "America the Beautiful" is one possibility, "This Land Is Your Land" is another. But these discussions have never gotten past the "wouldn't-it-interesting-if" stage, and until then, Americans will continue to sing about flags waving through savage nights and perilous fights. Even a polluted footstep can't keep Old Glory down.
Um...erm...only eight lines long? Not quite. In fact, the original song consists of four verses of eight lines each--32 lines total. And while most people do indeed have Verse 1 committed to memory, Verses 2-4 are never sung and remain unknown to most Americans.
For the record, the complete lyrics to "The Star Spangled Banner" are as follows:
Oh, say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, thro' the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watch'd, were so gallantly streaming?
And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof thro' the night that our flag was still there.
O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
On the shore dimly seen thro' the mists of the deep,
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream:
'T is the star-spangled banner: O, long may it wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps' pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
O, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand,
Between their lov'd homes and the war's desolation;
Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land
Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserv'd us as a nation!
Then conquer we must, when our cause is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!
A complete history of "The Star Spangled Banner" can be found here.
Okay, you can see why most people stick with the first verse.
"As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses"? Sounds like a tongue twister in the making.
"Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps' pollution"? Mixed metaphor alert! Mixed metaphor alert!
"No refuge could save the hireling and slave"? Uhhhhhh...let's just say this lyric reflects the time period its composer lived in and leave it that, okay? And avoid singing it anywhere above 125th Street in Manhattan.
The National Anthem Project, founded by patriotic music teachers, aims to teach kids about the song's history--goofy mixed metaphors and all.
The other main challenge--aside from memorizing the lines about footsteps causing pollution--is actually singing the song. This is harder than it looks because "The Star Spangled Banner" is a song of swoops and dips, one that even professional opera singers have difficulty mastering, and if you're an untrained singer with a voice like an out-of-tune foghorn, you'll be struggling with the melody and hoping your voice won't give out. (Of course, if you're really such a lousy singer, you'll never be called upon to sing at any public anyway.)
As a spokesman for the National Anthem Project puts it: "It is a very challenging song, you are right about that. But that is why we want music teachers helping young people deal with it." Just think, one of the kids they're reaching could become the next Whitney Houston, belting out the national anthem in the midst of a sporting event, thus helping to lift the national spirit during a time of war.
Conversely, they could also become the next Carl Lewis or Roseanne Barr--celebrities who botched the song. Barr's then-spouse, Tom Arnold, defended her, saying, "Most people can't sing the song. She represented those people. She sang her heart out." Carl Lewis, who was actually trying for a singing career at one point, simply--what's a good word to use here?--overreached. Yeah, that's it.
Periodically, people have suggested replacing the national anthem with another one--a song easier on the vocal cords but no less patriotic. "America the Beautiful" is one possibility, "This Land Is Your Land" is another. But these discussions have never gotten past the "wouldn't-it-interesting-if" stage, and until then, Americans will continue to sing about flags waving through savage nights and perilous fights. Even a polluted footstep can't keep Old Glory down.
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