When
composer/conductor John Williams opened last Friday’s broadcast of “A
Capitol Fourth” on NPR and WUKY-FM, he offered his “new arrangement” of
our national anthem, the
“Star Spangled Banner.”
In that spirit I’d like to offer my own arrangement---get rid of it.
First,
as written, the “Banner” is UNsingable by 90% of Americans. Those high
notes, much too high notes (Williams reworked them into a lower key I
think) are just too, too
much. We either mumble through them, or pass altogether while the
counter-tenors and altos have a field day. What good is a national
anthem that citizens can’t sing? It’s supposed to rally us, not cause us
to cringe as those near us try to sing it.
Second,
it’s music is an old tavern drinking song..an old ENGLISH drinking
song. That’s right, good old F. S. Key penned his poem of defiance to
Great Britain and then used
a Brit song for his music. Lotta sense there.
Third,
it celebrates just one event in America’s long and storied history..the
battle of Fort McHenry in 1814…(part of the War of 1812 most historians
would like the US to
forget, ‘cause we lost it. Our history books pass over how the Brits
burned Washington---we lost our National Capital in this war and we want
to observe it in song?
Fourth,
if this music deserves to be our National Anthem why did it take until
1931 for Congress to pass a resolution making it so??? 118 years we had
no such anthem, while
using “Hail Columbia” and “My Country Tis of Thee” (a much worthier
song) and others as stand-ins for a National Anthem.
Congress
got it wrong in ’31…no surprise surely..but now that Mr. Williams has
suggested a “new arrangement”, why not start all over..find a better
song, at least one that
most of us can sing…before we shout “Play Ball.”
I'm just sayin'...NOPE...not singin'...
No comments:
Post a Comment