England's national anthem: 'God Save the Queen' versus 'Jerusalem'

Coventry Telegraph ^ | Jul 2018 | Bobby Bridge

[IronJack]

I’m not accusing Blake of radical egalitarianism but of “Romantic” pipe-dreamery.

America’s alabaster cities weren’t built solely on the oppressive labor practices of English industrialization. Feudalism had reigned in England for centuries, and merely shed its ermine for tweed when industry supplanted agriculture. America had rejected the feudal structures of the Mother Country and even though it indulged some of the same abuses, it did not go to the extremes Britain did in shunning its oppressive past.

We never empowered a Cromwell because we never needed one.

[IronJack]

Both are incorrect, when taken in the extreme.

[mosesdapoet]

Prior to WWI the music and similar lyrics were used by Germany as its national anthem. Also Our “My Country Tis of Thee” came close to being our National anthem

[Mrs. Don-o]

OK, I get your point of view--- and I like the image of "shedding its ermine for tweed."

You might be interested in reading "Labor's Untold Story" by Morais and Boyer. My father put it in my hands when I was about 12. (I'm a desendant of iron foundry workers and runaway indentured servant girls). You want land and labor stolen and sold, murder in the mines and mills, hungry mothers, battles, and bloody betrayals---

There are a number of things different about the US and Britain, of course. The oppressed in the British Isles died alongside their children in the workhouses --- or came to the USA. And the oppressed in the USA went West. We had that safety valve: one step ahead of the Pinkertons, change your name and make a new start in Wichita.

[NFHale]

RE Russian anthem:

Did they just keep the same music, but change the lyrics?

[IronJack]

You want land and labor stolen and sold, murder in the mines and mills, hungry mothers, battles, and bloody betrayals---

Nah. I want a fair wage and reasonable working conditions. But I also want profits and capital and personal accountability and freedom from overweening government that, in the name of mercy and compassion, actually tyrannizes its citizens.

And I don't believe for an instant that Man is capable of building any but a poor imitation of biblical Jerusalem.

[bigbob]

“Jerusalem” by Herb Alpert would make a dandy national anthem:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7lJJDiYyHo

[Fiji Hill]

Did they just keep the same music, but change the lyrics?Did they just keep the same music, but change the lyrics? Yes, they did. And some of the phraseology is eerily similar to the Stalinist and Brezhnevist versions. For example, the chorus begins, as did the Communist versions, "Slavsya otechestvo nasha svobodnoye!" (glory to our free fatherland!). It also seems to rip off from another Stalinist patriotic song, "Shiroka Strana, Moya Rodnaya" (Vast Country, My Homeland), which is still used today, although the phrase "in big golden letters we write the Stalinist code" has been replaced.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Yikes! Sorry, my fault, I wrote ineptly. I didn't mean "you want..." (that's what I wrote!) as if to say "Hey creep, this is what you want, eh?" but I meant "OK, historically if you want to see a real picture of..."

Not a personal or rhetorical accusation.

"But I also want profits and capital and personal accountability and freedom from overweening government that, in the name of mercy and compassion, actually tyrannizes its citizens."

Rightly so. We're on the same page here.

[virgil]

I Vow to Thee My Country or Land of Hope and Glory are my picks. Jerusalem seems a touch modernist to me. Or just stick with God Save the Queen.

[dfwgator]

It also seems to rip off from another Stalinist patriotic song, “Shiroka Strana, Moya Rodnaya” (Vast Country, My Homeland)

I believe that was the source for the Interval Signal for Radio Moscow. Any shortwave enthusiast will recognize it immediately......

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rn0pzC5T3GU

[Fiji Hill]

I believe that was the source for the Interval Signal for Radio Moscow. Any shortwave enthusiast will recognize it immediately......

I did--I listened to Radio Moscow during the Soviet era.

Vast country, my homeland
Filled with forests, mountains and rivers.
I know of no other country
Where a man would want to breathe.

[nutmeg]

Both are absolutely beautiful. Thanks for those links.

[sinsofsolarempirefan]

Cromwell was regarded as a hero to the American revolutionaries though.

[Cronos]

I like the Polish national anthem - very defiant. The music's good too -- or the Italian

[Cronos]

well the trees were planted by Napoleon - who wanted his soldiers to march in their shade.

you must remember that it was essentially France who created Germany - by invading it and destroying the HRE and creating the German union, it created Germany

[IronJack]

Because he defeated the notion of absolute monarchy, the very thing the Revolutionists were fighting as well.

But, like the Jacobins and Napolean a century after him, Cromwell simply substituted one tyranny for another.

[dfwgator]

I always like to point out that the Polish anthem includes a reference to Napoleon. Poland is one of the few countries where Napoleon is still thought of rather fondly.

[dfwgator]

Interesting background for that song.

It was introduced in a movie, that plot was basically, a woman from the US had a black kid, and fled the US for the Soviet Union because of racism, and finds a home in the Soviet Union where she meets a circus performer, and they live happily ever after in the Stalinist paradise.

[dfwgator]

I always liked how Radio Moscow closed with a swinging version of “Moscow Nights”.