On the anniversary of The Star-Spangled Banner

Today is the 80th anniversary of the Star-Spangle Banner, our national anthem. As many have discovered it is a rather difficult anthem to sing. While living in DeLand we would attend some of the Stetson University baseball games with our friends Sam and Dawn. Sam in employed at a military defense supplier and was a distinguished military veteran. He always shouted the same thing after the invited singer finished singing the national anthem, “Great job. Thank you” regardless how well it was sung.

My favorite story concerning the singing of the anthem came from Robert Merrill, the operatic star with a tremendous voice. He was attending a New Yankees baseball game and the individual who had been invited to sing the anthem didn’t show. The announcer invited everyone to stand and join in singing the national anthem.

Robert stood up with everyone else and added his great voice to those around him. As he shared on the Merv Griffin show, after it was all over and people were re-taking their seats the man right in front of Mr. Merrill turned around and said, “Big deal!” If he had only known whom he had just listened to …

Happy anniversary Star-Spangle Banner! May you continue to bring lumps to throats as you challenge the best singers in our land to cover the wide range of your notes. Oh, by the way, one of the weird laws of our land … it is illegal to cheer at the end of the national anthem. Just a little crazy law … like the Florida law that I heard about yesterday: It is illegal for a single woman to skydive on Sunday.

Also, as we are in a national discussion concerning the budget crisis, I wonder how much would be saved if we stop the flyovers of military aircraft during the singing of the national anthem? While it is thrilling to see those jets and to feel their thundering sound, I have often thought, “what a waste of money.”

One last note concerns the lyrics to the national anthem. Here is what Francis Scott Key actually wrote in 1814. The Army and Navy had already adopted it as an anthem long before the United States Congress officially made it our national anthem in 1931. I wonder how many of us would mess up the lyrics if we were “required” to sing the entire anthem?

Oh, there was one more observation … why do singers feel it necessary to re-write the music by adding their own “twist” to the singing of the anthem? It is fine just the way it is … sing on America … sing on!

Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, 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 through 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 in the stream:
'Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh 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 washed 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!

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it 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!

Quote for today: by Minna Irving in “Betsy’s Battle Flag”
A nation thrills, a nation bleeds,
A nation follows where it leads,
And every man is proud to yield
His life upon a crimson field
For Betsy’s battle flag.