They play the stupid thing AND the state anthem here before every symphony performance.
To me, the playing the National Anthem is conservative political correctness. It’s a meaningless ceremony that no-one dares oppose for fear of appearing un-American. It’s like having a sign-language interpreter at every left-wing political rally in the 80’s.
That would seriously bother me.
That being said, the best rendition of The Star-Spangled Banner I ever heard was in similar circumstances. It was about two weeks after 9/11, so it was sort of OK, or at least understandable. The venue was the Chicago Lyric Opera, for a dress rehearsal of Otello. The Lyric Opera gives out dress rehearsal tickets to music schools, in particular graduate voice programs, which means the entire audience (about 3000) consisted of classically trained vocalists. The Star-Spangled Banner is notoriously hard, so large groups singing it is generally an unpleasant experience. 3000 well trained singers singing it (in an acoustically designed space) was something else entirely.
Especially if it’s sung by Ronan Tynan. shudder
God, what an awful voice.
Yes, our National Anthem is basically a solid work.
We do get more animated on the Last Night of the Proms, when the audience sing along with Elgar’s
Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1 in D major (‘Land of Hope and Glory’).
The Welsh have an unfair advantage, since they have Welsh Male Voice choirs!. 
To hear a Welsh crowd singing is a truly remarkable experience.
When in another country, you’re a guest in their “home” and should stand respectfully, IMHO.
In that vein, this is an outstanding performance (Marvin Gaye singing the U.S. national anthem). Dude could sing.
Yup. Or just plain ignorance.
That’s the trouble with making up one’s own individualized responses to conventional etiquette situations. Most people know what the conventional rules are, but they don’t know what your rules are.
If you sit through a national anthem, nobody can tell whether you’re making a deliberate gesture of contempt for the country in question, or making a deliberate gesture of contempt for the concept of the nation-state in general, or just unaware of what you’re supposed to do, or just being a lazy asshole, or just expressing your dislike of national anthems.
In any case, the basic etiquette rule about people who are violating etiquette rules at a public event is that you can politely ask them to stop if they are personally inconveniencing you. Otherwise, you should just ignore them; the only proper way to express disapproval at their unmannerly behavior is to behave coldly towards them.
So if you choose to sit through the national anthem, your more patriotically-inclined or more etiquette-minded neighbors may be offended at your violation of anthem etiquette. But they are not entitled to beat you up, yell at you, try to pull you up out of your seat, or anything like that. Your not standing for the anthem doesn’t inconvenience them, and they should not confront you about it.
But they’re not obligated to be nice or friendly to you either. If you try to talk to one of your anthem-standing neighbors after the anthem’s over and you get rebuffed with a cold look or a cold shoulder, you just have to put up with it. People whose principles require them to behave rudely (and not standing for a national anthem is considered rude by the standards of conventional etiquette) should be prepared to pay the price of having their rude behavior disapproved of.
When in Rome, do as the Romans do.
When in my home country, I stand and face the flag, take off my hat, place my hand over my heart, and caterwaul right along with the singer. Then I scream “Play ball!!”, plop down and take my first swig of my $12 (with tip) Budweiser.
As God intended it to be.
Oh, wait, that’s another Pit thread.
Whoever sang the national anthem in that Obama video should be taken out and shot. That was awful. And, while you’re at it, take out the three guys who sang the song at the FC Dallas vs Houston Dynamo playoff game on Friday night. At the very least, they should be given a ceremonial whipping until we received a promise that they never sing in public again.
Wow, 3000 trained singers…that would have been fun. I’ve had enough voice lessons to know that I’m never going to be a great operatic singer, but I did learn (among a lot of other stuff) that I have a wider range (on both ends) than I used to think…and the anthem is fun, what with the high notes. I’ll have to try singing it drunk sometime, because I can’t imagine making those notes drunk, but you never know.
I don’t object to it at sporting events and whatnot, but whoever decided that we should all love God Bless America should be taken out and shot. Bleah. And I’ve had to sing it, when I was in a college choir…even right after 9/11 it made me ill. I kept quiet on that. The rest of the concert was patriotic stuff, and was great, but that one song…
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AIUI there’s a vocal, if smallish, group that still keeps pushing for God Bless America to replace The Star-Spangled Banner as the national anthem. I remember hearing a lot growing up about how GBA was the better song for an anthem, because alone of all the well-known patriotic songs it didn’t celebrate war.
After all, violence never solved anything, and war is never the answer.
I can actually understand the reasoning, though I don’t agree with it. But I’d think Woodie Guthrie’s This Land is Your Land, This Land is My Land, and far less likely to raise hackles than GBA.
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When I was little, I stood and put my hand over my heart for the anthem and the Pledge. I’ve never been a citizen, but I never thought to question whether I should or shouldn’t (I attended school in a small southern suburb, for what it’s worth). I’m not sure what I would do now - I’m still not a citizen, but I identify more with American culture than Korean. I’d probably just stand without the hand over heart. Maybe that would change if I actually became a citizen. It’s a fine point, but an important one for me.
Yes, when there is a Canadian team visiting, the Canadian anthem is sung, then then ours. I stand and sing both. Both flags are present.
I echo the sentiment that it should be a played recording and not a performance.
You know it’s a really difficult song to sing when Whitney Houston pre-records it. And Steve Perry, the golden throated singer formerly of Journey, who could reach notes only my dog could hear, said this when asked if he’d ever consider singing the anthem:
“Thanks for that but that song is really a serious, demanding song. Everyone plays around with the melody because the original melody, if sung as it was written, is demanding. They make it easy on themselves by changing it. If I ever do sing it, I would want to sing it with all it original melody and majesty that it deserves.”
Hell, if HE thinks it’s challenging, what chance do mere mortals have?
I’ve been to the Olympic Games several times over the course of my life, and I’m sure most of you know that they always play the national anthem of the winner during the gold medal ceremony. So I’ve heard a number of national anthems live, and they often were not the anthem of the host country. The audience stands respectfully.
Ed
The rule for any such ceremony that is not your own – whether an anthem, a pledge, obeisance to a royal, or prayer – is that you show respect but not allegiance.
If your national anthem is played, you show allegiance by whatever gesture is usual – singing it, hand over heart, saluting if in uniform, etc. Standing and (for men) removing hats is a gesture of respect, not allegiance, and is done for all anthems, because although you have no allegiance to a foreign country, you presumably respect its citizens that are present.
Similarly with behaviour towards a royal: a subject of Her Majesty the Queen bows or curtseys, as a sign of allegiance, but a foreigner simply shows her the respect due to any head of state, without bowing or curtseying, as s/he bears no allegiance to her.
Likewise for prayer – if you are present at a prayer for a religion to which you do not belong, you are silent, stand, and are seated when the congregation does so, and adopt similar basic standards of dress (donning or doffing hats, covering shoulders, removing shoes) in order to be respectful by not disrupting the service; but you need not kneel, recite prayers, or otherwise indicate allegiance to that religion.
Guthrie wrote that song as a reply to “God Bless America”, and it was political indeed - Guthrie was a Communist fellow-traveler. And as much as it is noncontroversial today, it would become very controversial if it were to become official.
In light of this information, I hereby propose that we change our national anthem to Don’t Stop Believin’.
BTW, several times in the Navy and once as a civilian I was obliged to show due respect to the Argentine national anthem.
That takes some doing - the thing is about 12 minutes long. So people who can’t be bothered to at least stand for ours get no sympathy from me.
Hijack subrant: “The Star-Spangled Banner” is a crappy national anthem anyway – musically, I mean, not because of some PC aversion to glorifying a battle.* It covers such a range of notes that practically no non-professional can sing it properly, and it’s not even very pleasant to hear. A much, much better anthem would be the comparatively obscure “This Is My Country” (lyrics at bottom of this page). That song is awesome! (I once sang it in a glee club.) My second choice would be “America the Beautiful.”
- The British National Anthem, “God Save the Queen” (or “King”) once included the following second verse:
Oh, Lord our God, arise
Scatter thine enemies
And make them fall!
Confound their politics,
Frustrate their knavish tricks!
On Thee our hopes we fix
God save us all!
At some point (I once read, in the Encyclopedia Americana, but can find no online cite) this was cut as being “too nationalistic.” Which makes no sense, as pointed out by George Orwell in his “As I Please” column in the Tribune, December 31, 1943: