February 19, 2010

Press play to listen

The modern Olympics started
in 1896, but it took 28 more years before the winners would hear their
national anthem during the medal ceremony.  

The Vancouver Games will conduct
86 medal ceremonies, during which any of the 82 countries present could
be serenaded with their national anthem.  But not all are created
equal — including ours.  

You probably knew the melody
for our national anthem, the Star Spangled Banner, came from a popular
British drinking song, and that Francis Scott Key added the words during
the War of 1812.  But you might not have known the Star Spangled
Banner didn’t become our national anthem until more than a century
later, in 1931.  And we didn’t start playing the song before
ball games until World War II. 

The Star Spangled Banner may
be two centuries old, but its status as our national anthem is relatively
new – and, I think, not beyond reconsideration.    

True, the song can be strong
and moving. But who can forget Carl Lewis’s version, which sounded
like a feral cat in serious pain, or actress Roseanne Barr’s rendition
– which put the “f” back in “professionalism”?

In their defense, the Star
Spangled Banner is notoriously difficult to sing – or even remember.  
Raise your hand if you really know what a “rampart” is?  That’s
what I thought.  Thank you.  

That’s just another reason
why I think we should consider adopting a different national anthem,
like “America, the Beautiful.”  In 1895, a Wellesley College
professor, fed up with the greed of the Robber Barons – sound familiar?
— took a train to Colorado, and was reminded along the way what a great
country this truly is.  When her poem was coupled with Samuel Ward’s
melody, a classic was born.     

For my money, Ray Charles’
version is the best.  When I hear him sing, “America, America,
God done shed his grace on thee.  And crown thy good, with brotherhood,
from sea to shining sea,” there aren’t too many things I wouldn’t
be willing to do for my country.  

Just a few years after “America,
the Beautiful” came out, Irving Berlin composed “God Bless America”
to inspire victory in World War One.  Twenty years later, he revised
it to respond to the Nazis’ rise to power.  

From the opening, “God Bless
America, Land that I love.,” to the close, “My home sweet home,”
Berlin doesn’t give you much to quibble about.  

If Ray Charles stamped “America,
the Beautiful,” as his own, surely “God Bless America” belongs
to Kate Smith.  But in the aftermath of Viet Nam, the patriotic
standard’s popularity was slipping — until the Philadelphia Flyers
hockey team started playing it before crucial contests.  They’ve
won some 80-percent of those games – and all three when Kate Smith
arrived to sing it in person.  Her first appearance, on May 19,
1974, preceded the Flyers’ 1-0 victory over Boston, for the Flyers’
first Stanley Cup.  Many credited Smith for lifting the crowd and
the team to new heights.  Even the famously tough Philly fans could
not boo Kate Smith.  

When the 1980 U.S. Olympic
hockey team pulled off the greatest upset in sports history, the players
spontaneously broke into a chorus – not of “The Star Spangled Banner,”
but “God Bless America.”

They couldn’t sing it quite
like Kate Smith, but they understood what they were singing, they understood
why, and they meant every word.  I think they were on to something.