[Pyro7480]

This one is all over the map.

[Vision]

Man these guys hate this country

[Hildy]

oy...any article which quotes that piece of S**T play, Angels in America, is an article not worth reading.

[Quilla]

I must be a softy for overrated songs. Every time I hear the Star-Spangled Banner my eyes well up with tears and I get chill bumps too.

[sinkspur]

The Star Spangled Banner is a second-tier work, compared to the beauty of the words and music of "America, " which really ought to be our National Anthem.

[GSWarrior]

Well, the Star Spangled Banner doesn't have a good beat and you can't dance to it....

Don't these folks have something better to write about?

[siunevada]

"He set the word 'free' to a note so high nobody can reach it."

Go ahead and cheat. Take it down an octave. Don't hurt yourself, for goodness sakes.

[basil]

And they wonder why they are losing readership!

[Michael.SF.]

two-thirds of Americans don't even know the words.....

Oh, really?

As we stand here waiting
for the ballgame to start
Let's give thanks for our hooooommeee
With it's two car garage.
Let's give thanks to TV and..............

/sarcasm

The reason many people do not know the words, is because you F'n liberals won't let it be taught in school!!!

[Names Ash Housewares]

Eff em!

Forever the rockets red glare!!!


http://homepage.mac.com/lightningrodpictures/iMovieTheater19.html

[elc]

Hmm. I'm torn on this one. I love what the Star Bangled Banner stands for. But I can't actually stand the song itself. I've always preferred both God Bless America and America the Beautiful. Maybe its from hearing the National Anthem butchered by so many performers.

[dfwgator]

They would be very happy if The Star Spangled Banner was replaced with The Internationale.

[citizen]

For anyone still buying this lie-rag, another reason to cancel it.

[OkiMusashi]

"Musically speaking, I'm not really a big fan of Francis Scott Key's Star-Spangled Banner with its awkward prosody and melisma-clogged penultimate line, but the lyric does contain one big idea - that a "land of the free" has to be also, at some level, a "home of the brave". - Mark Steyn

It works for me.

[Echo Talon]

NY Times stock is over valued.

[CholeraJoe]

"The Star Spangled Banner" can bring chills to a grown man.

My favorite movie scene is from "Tora, Tora, Tora," where at morning raising of the colors, the band of the USS Arizona continues to play the National Anthem as Japanese bombers zoom by.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

My personal preference would be for "America, the Beautiful" (...from sea to shining sea). Reference version by Ray Charles. Sends chills down my spine every time I hear it.

[Stone Mountain]

Well, the song is extremely difficult to sing, and it's true that more than half of the country doesn't know all the words. And if you don't believe that, you haven't been to a ball game lately.

The idea that the guy who wrote the tune made "land of the free" specifically difficult to sing to me is ludicrous though - musically, it's the climax of the piece which is often in music an extended high note both for contrast and drama.

That being said, I like the Star Spangled Banner but (and feel free to flame away here), I think my favorite National Anthem is Canada's. Patriotic, easy to sing, meaninful, and I really like the line, "We stand on guard for thee." And if singers can't hit the high note in the penultimate line, they can go low without compromising the song! : )

[tophat9000]

an African-American character named Belize suggests that the difficulty was part of the composer's plan. "The white cracker who wrote the national anthem knew what he was doing," Belize insists. "He set the word 'free' to a note so high nobody can reach it."

That Belize problem, he doesn't get it...it's reachable, but you got to work hard for it and work hard to keep it...it ain't a cheap "note" to reach and easy to loose

[Tzimisce]

...would you like it better if it was sung in Spanish?

[Billthedrill]

The flag's kind of hard to draw too. Why don't we just replace it with that nice rainbow-striped one and the National Anthem with "We Are The World"?