Posted on 06/08/2002 7:42:04 AM PDT by TaRaRaBoomDeAyGoreLostToday!
By TODD HARTMAN DENVER - Poudre High School's decision to play the World anthem for its graduation ceremony sparked an angry reaction from a parent who wanted to hear the national anthem and stirred a dust-up on talk radio this week. Gail Wagner, whose daughter graduated May 24, wrote a letter to the school principal, the district superintendent and the Denver Rocky Mountain News calling the anthem "an insipid little song about a world of peace and love" and an insult to America. She said it took the place of the national anthem. It did not, said Poudre High Principal Sandra Lundt. Lundt said she was surprised to find the decision scolded on Mike Rosen's KOA talk show and Peter Boyles' KHOW show Thursday morning. Lundt said the Fort Collins school has never played the national anthem at its graduation. "This was never meant to take the place of the national anthem," Lundt said. "It's an anthem that really celebrates every nation." Wagner's husband, Fred, and daughter, Erin, also opposed the playing of the world anthem. Erin said she was surprised "The Star Spangled Banner" wasn't played. "It didn't make much sense," Erin said. "We live in America, so they should have played it. I guess I would say I was offended." Lundt said the school's senior class council, a group of 15 to 20 students, participated in the decision to play the world anthem. The school's orchestra, band and choir teamed to perform the piece. The senior class council "was very excited about the opportunity," Lundt said, noting that one of the people who helped promote broader performance of the anthem, Ed Goodman, is a 1973 graduate of Poudre High. The world anthem was conceived in 1996 and completed by 2000. The idea behind the piece, according to the Web site www.worldanthem.org, is this: "We believe there is a wonderful way to bring a message of hope, healing, peace and unification to all people through the universal language of music ... to give the world a gift, to bring about a symbol for peace and a common spirit of trust toward the idea of one people, one world." Its creation, even those involved acknowledge, borders on the bizarre. Music from the anthems of every country in the world were combined in a computer. Using musicology software, a blended creation emerged. The same technique was used to produce the lyrics, according to Goodman. "This is not two bars of 'The Star Spangled Banner,' then a bar of 'O Canada,'" Goodman said. "It's more like if you took all the melodies, harmonies, rhythms and tempos and somehow were able to average them. ... It's very, very sophisticated; it took years of work to accomplish." This means, Goodman said, that the piece wasn't composed by any one person or any one nation. "The point of it was to have one song that all nations could share," he said. The piece has a significant history in Colorado. It was heard for the first time at the Denver Millennium Celebration on Dec. 31, 2000, at the stroke of midnight in conjunction with fireworks, according to historians of the anthem. In November 2001, the Colorado Symphony Orchestra provided the first live performance of the piece. Goodman said that even Air Force's Band of the Rockies is taken with the piece and arranging its own version. It's slated to be played at an upcoming global peace conference in Croatia and at a ceremony celebrating the 40th anniversary of the Peace Corps this summer. The Wagners are not impressed. "No matter how much the principal gushed over the privilege of being one of the first to hear this piece performed, we did not feel privileged or find it inspirational, heartwarming or moving," Gail Wagner wrote to the News.
Debate over anthem surprises principal
Scripps-McClatchy Western Service
June 07, 2002
This would give the demokratic leftist liberals a hay day.
No, just Mexicans. They HATE America. This school even post information on their outside message board ONLY in Spanish.
I have heard of something like it. It is primarily a percussive piece.
The main score being a boot heel crushing into a face, repeatedly, and forever.
Well then why did it?
"We believe there is a wonderful way to bring a message of hope, healing, peace and unification to all people”
This is BS. The UNITED STATES of AMERICA brings hope, healing and peace. Take your unification and shove it.
Sick I tell ya!
You tell 'em!!!
Is this the new euphemism for the "Internationale" ?
Looks like you got out just in time.
Not a Theologian but I will give it a shot.
The world had just (a few hundred years before) been destroyed except for eight people because, to quote:
“And God said to Noah, "The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. ” Gen 6:13
There is a theory that before the flood there was a very advance culture on earth, which is logical if you considered a few points.
1.) The world that they lived in was a very gentle as far climate.
2.) The people who lived there were much closer to genetic perfection
3.) They lived an extremely long time. If you are going to live 900 years you might take 200 to study how the grass grows. What is time to you? You have plenty of it.
4.) Everyone spoke the same language and so the free exchange of ideas was no problem at all.
After the flood some steps were taken to prevent this from continuing. The life span was shortened to an average of 70-80 years. The world became a much tougher place to live making survival hard. The water canopy was gone raising the amount of genetic mutation and decease on earth. And speech was confused preventing the free exchange of ideas.
This was meant to slow us down so that we would not destroy the earth before our ethics reach parity with our intelligence. Before the flood we reached a level of pure communal evil that we have not reached since, to the point only one person was considered worth saving out of the whole bunch. The rest of the family was saved because of him.
a.cricket
"One world built on a firm foundation.
One world no longer cursed by war.
Let no mortal man
Change the Master's plan,
One great world at peace once more--
One world built forevermore.
--------and on ------
It was more of an inspirational hymn, than a PC gimmick.
What a load of fetid dingo's kidneys
The 3 Musketeers?!? ;^)
Actually, more like the collective (the hive?) supporting all... from each according to their abilities, to each according to their needs... and individual rights be damned. The Collective is more important!
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