On 28 Aug 2004, at 10:05 PM, Crystal Premo wrote:
and no one asked what I'd choose for our anthem), <<
What *would* you choose?
No one asked me either, and I'm not even an American, but I somehow got to choose my, uh, host country's national anthem, it would be (hands down) the Ray Charles version of "America The Beautiful."
Sorry, but "versions" don't count. "Performers" don't count. "Recordings" don't count. An anthem that represents the people has to COME from the people, and has to be singable by The People. It can't be imposed by a state legislature, like a state insect! Witness our miserable state of Virginia, which (legislatively) rejected James Bland's "Carry Me Back to Old Virginia" because his 19th century lyrics could offend some people. A state legislative committee was charged to find a new State Song. They have failed miserably. But they also established, in the process, how many bad songs are written by how many untalented people! Jimmy Dean (the sausage guy with one--count them: one--hit to his credit, lobbied like an actual politician to get his mediocre song adopted. One of the most popular submissions was a hit song from the early 1980s which could not remotely be sung by your average audience in anything like the version that was recorded. Just another terrible instance of the morphing of our culture from a muscially productive one to a musically spectator one. Sad.
John
-- John & Susie Howell Virginia Tech Department of Music Blacksburg, VA 24061-0240 VOX (540) 231-8411; FAX (540) 231-5034 [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ Finale mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.shsu.edu/mailman/listinfo/finale
