It is the kind of song that gets dragged out on heady occasions, to impart a sense of significance and solemnity. Performances of the “The Star-Spangled Banner” at political rallies and sporting events are often bombastically staged, with American flags projected on Jumbotrons and flyovers by military jets, kitsch spectacles that aim to stir patriotism through shock and awe. Lean on meWhen you’re not strongAnd I’ll be your friendI’ll help you carry onFor it won’t be long‘Til I’m gonna needSomebody to lean on. Among the bands that made their mark on Slash Records were X, the Germs, Los Lobos, the Blasters and the Violent Femmes. There’s a fluted colonnade, four eagles with majestically fanned-out wings, swags and stars, and, at the very top of the big pile, the figure of Columbia, the traditional female personification of the United States, clutching an American flag. You could say that this was his birthright. The result is a tune that is charmless and difficult to sing, which meanders through wan melodic passages en route to a big climactic cry — the money-shot high note on “O’er the land of the freeeeee” — that defeats 99% of vocalists who attempt it. Garth Brooks sang it, after a fashion, in a medley with “America the Beautiful,” at a 2011 Kennedy Center gala whose attendees included four former U.S. presidents. The Atlanta native rhymes about some of the problems faced by black people in America today including crooked cops and … San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick, center, kneels during the national anthem. Of course, the biggest difference between “Lean on Me” and “The Star-Spangled Banner” is obvious to all who have ears. It is certainly farfetched to imagine Congress decommissioning “The Star-Spangled Banner,” let alone voting to replace it with the likes of “Lean on Me.” There are more pressing matters to attend to. When Major League Baseball begins its coronavirus-shortened 60-game schedule next week, “The Star-Spangled Banner” will be played before the games. They hear a message of friendship and fellow-feeling so straightforward it may at first appear banal. He joined the Navy at age 17 and served for nine years; he began writing and singing songs while stationed in Guam. It’s a message you could build something on, a pretty solid foundation for a decent society. The Francis Scott Key monument in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park is one of those old-fashioned pieces of public art that, shall we say, lays it on thick. “I just went one, two, three, four, up and down the piano… Even a tiny child can play that.” The lyrics are nearly all monosyllables, and in singing the verses, Withers largely shuns syncopation, letting the words fall out precisely in time with the chord changes, one syllable per chord. On the original recording, these lines, delivered by Withers in a warm, commanding baritone, land as a simple statement of fact, stripped of sentimentality. Withers told Rolling Stone that he composed it on piano, in rudimentary fashion. If you think about it, it’s not a good. But like “The Star-Spangled Banner” — like, for that matter, “America the Beautiful” — “Lift Every Voice” is out of step with the 21st century, with a prim melody redolent of Victorian light opera and a lyric sheet full of antiquated poesy. For music archivists, a contemporary dilemma: Should racist songs from our past be heard today? Key is captured in a heroic pose: enthroned on a big chair with pen in hand, looking every inch the sort of poetaster who would come up with lines like “O’er the ramparts we watched / Were so gallantly streaming.”. It is imposing and fussy, a 52-foot-tall chunk of travertine and marble loaded up with classical trimmings. Today, Francis Scott Key is no longer in Golden Gate Park. Looks like your browser doesn't support JavaScript. Contact Ada Limón at saeed.jones+AdaLimon@buzzfeed.com. California’s November election will feature 12 statewide ballot measures. The poem, written by Key on Sept. 14, 1814, after he witnessed the bombardment of an American fort by British ships in Baltimore Harbor, includes the lines: “No refuge could save the hireling and slave/From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave.”, Scholars disagree about the meaning of this couplet. Your guide to the 2020 election in California. She earned an MFA from New York University, and is the recipient of fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, and … song. But it was also Key’s role as a songwriter — his famous ode to the land of the free and the home of the brave — that made him a target for protesters. Esses Cookies nos permitem coletar alguns dados pessoais sobre você, como sua ID exclusiva atribuída ao seu dispositivo, endereço de IP, tipo de dispositivo e navegador, conteúdos visualizados ou outras ações realizadas usando nossos serviços, país e idioma selecionados, entre outros. Kaepernick pointed out that he was making a statement about racial injustice, not protesting the “The Star-Spangled Banner” itself. It is all here. The song is tuned into the reality that life is hard, that there is pain in the past and in the present. The dramatis personae are you, me, all of us. The truth is, I’ve never cared for the National - The Academy of American Poets is the largest membership-based nonprofit organization fostering an appreciation for contemporary poetry and supporting American poets. It speaks in plain musical language, without a trace of bombast, in a tidy arrangement that unfolds over a few basic chords. Traditional national anthems direct our eyes upwards. Highland Park has long been the heart of L.A.'s musical bohemia, home to Chicano punk and Billie Eilish. Yet it has long been a kind of national anthem. “Lean on Me,” from the 1972 album"Still Bill,” was his biggest hit. (Always, always, there is war and bombs.) Miley Cyrus’ love of cover songs runs deep, from Britney Spears to the Cure. Miley Cyrus has been busy putting her stamp on songs by Britney Spears, the Cranberries, the Cure, Pearl Jam and other surprising cover renditions. Too high for most of us with “the rockets. In the late 1960s, he moved to Los Angeles, where he found work in an aircraft parts factory. He had salt-of-the-earth bona fides to match any American troubadour’s. This was typical of Withers, who died in March, at age 81, of coronary heart disease. 1 in 1972; 15 years later, Club Nouveau took a spunky electro-R&B version to the top of the Hot 100.) “It’s a terrible piece of music,” said Frank Sinatra in 1969. The changes we need in this country will come not through symbolic gestures but when laws are changed, when reforms are enacted, when money is thrown at problems.

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