Post-Thanksgiving Ruminations on the Mystique of Spiritual LoveOK so it's not that - but that's a pretty good headline.
Reasearch work on the sheaf of manuscripts alluded to in the last post is continuing apace, and I could conceiveably put up some of the material documented since right now. But that can wait, as I'd like to get the rest of it finished and put it all up at one shot.
Some of you might wonder: "Why is it that Uncle Dave, unknown artist extrodinaire, wants to post information about unfinished works that are nearly thirty years old?" Because someday I'm going to die, and may not remain unknown forever. I don't want someone poking through my things after I'm gone and saying "what the hell is all this stuff?" I've done it myself time and time again. I believe an artist has an obligation to help sort out one's output for the benefit of posterity. Very few take the time to do so, as we are all so busy working on the next thing that comes along. What happened to the last thing is often the furthest idea from one's mind.
Ladies and gentlemen, Please Rise for the National AnthemMy wife suggested that I write this up: does anyone pay attention to the manner in which the National Anthem is performed at sports events? I do - I remember when the given renderings are beautiful, and when they are particularly not so. Most versions these days are terribly self-interested, a platform for a soul singer to perform glottal ululations that are supposed to be vocally dazzling, but are in fact vocally ugly. The performance given by Nona Hendryx at the miserable Lions/Falcons outing this past Thanksgiving day is a case in point. It was not only disrepsectful, but uninspired.
On the History Channel there was a piece on the Detroit Tigers winning the World Series in 1968 - a miraculous event that temporarily put an end to a grueling period of civic unrest in Detroit - and they played a bit of Jose Feliciano's epic rendering of the National Anthem at a game in that series. I remember that - it seemed like it would never end, and I was a big fan of Jose at the time, but this was definately over the top. Perhaps Jose's pioneering performance represented the turn of the tide, from the basic performance of a civic duty to a manner in which to promote one's artistry (and ego).
This isn't always a bad thing - Chris Botti's performance of the National Anthem during one of the World Series games was deeply beautiful and moving. He even managed to wind a bit of a related tune, I can't recall just what, but something traditional, into the performance. It was gorgeous. The most famous performance of all, I suspect, is Rosanne Barr's notorious rendering in Cincinnati some fifteen or so years ago. But the Nona Hendryx one I heard on Thursday really wasn't far off Barr's performance, at least in my view.
I am ambivalent about Jimi Hendrix' famous performance of the National Anthem from Woodstock; to me it is the apogee of irreverance and disrespect, and the product of a time in which everything American was being held up to scrutiny. But not everyone feels that way - I had a friend in high school, very conservative who ultimately entered the military, that decribed his feeling (or rather, a "dream" about) it this way: "When I hear Jimi playing the National Anthem, I am standing up there right next to him with my hand on my heart and a tear in my eye." Ridiculous! I thought then, though I respected his right to say so. Actually, now I also respect his right to feel that way about it to, even though it doesn't work for me. I have come to terms with the fact that I am just not a Jimi Hendrix fan, and that may color the way I respond to these challenges.
I would love to hear the National Anthem performed just as it is, without the pauses in the last phrase and its clumsy emphasis on the words "and the" before the word "brave." Not everyone is crazy about "The Star-Spangled Banner." I remember WAIF once did a multi-band benefit called "Silly Songs" in which each band did a rendition of a silly novelty song. My friend Melissa, who is in the Fairmount Girls now but was in The Murkins then, wanted to do "The Star-Spangled Banner" as part of THAT event. The suggestion made it no futher than to her fellow bandswomen.
I once played a service in a small Presbyterian church where an Indian-American (not "Native") minister gave a sermon on the evils of "The Star-Spangled Banner." It began life as a drinking song, he said, and is not appropriate for use as the anthem of a great nation such as the United States. A lot of immigrants to America don't like the anthem - it seems overblown and stodgy, and is certainly wordy, whereas if you come from Mexico or Cuba your anthem is spicy and catchy.
Certainly the words and melody make for an uncomfortable fit, and the Acreonatic Society, which gave birth to the melody sometime in the 1750s, was an organization that utilized drinking as part of their gatherings. But this just isn't any "drinking song" - "The Acreonatick Hymn" was their anthem, and the Acreonatics were a fraternal organization that represented the highest level of intellectual and social achievement in England in their time. Most of their meetings were taken up in the singing of catches, rounds and glees, an important component of the backstory on the development of popular melodies sung in the English language.
The tune was well-known enough in early America that poet Robert Treat Paine Jr. used it to sing his poem "Adams and Liberty" in 1798, an event which by all accounts, was a pivotal one in the history of patriotically centered art in early America. This was the predecessor of "The Star-Spangled Banner," and if you think the National Anthem is difficult to sing as it is, you should try to sing "Adams and Liberty" sometime - it is extremely wordy and hard to sing. Perhaps when Francis Scott Key's text came along in 1814 and gradually began to replace Treat Paine Jr.'s words, early America breathed a sigh of relief!
Uncle Dave Lewis
uncledavelewis@hotmail.com