> [John Turner] sent me one of his publications once, a jolly little > collection of miscellaneous Scottish tunes. It included a version of > the Stars and Stripes, published in Edinburgh in seventeen oatcake; I > think he was suggesting that it's a Scots song originally, and given > that anything worthwhile in this world has a Scottish connection, he's > probably right. Cue Jack Campin to give us the whole story (or a > scathing put-down of such preposterous claims). If you mean the (rather good) march "The Stars and Stripes Forever", that would be pretty astonishing and I'd like to know more about it. It sure doesn't sound like anything that could have an 18th century antecedent. If you mean the music for "The Star-Spangled Banner", yawn. I think they teach the origins of that godawful tune in American high schools; at least it is rare to find an educated American who can't name the original. I think we can blame the English for it, though it must have been reprinted in some of those late-eighteenth-century Scottish drinking-club songbooks whose contents display no discernible taste whatever on the part of the editor. But the Americans get to carry the can for the present-day text (which is even worse). =================== <http://www.purr.demon.co.uk/jack/> =================== Posted to Scots-L - The Traditional Scottish Music & Culture List - To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
