Story Here
You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown.

Wow is this the talk of the town today. Personally, I view this as a social statement. Good for her. Good for Denver. Great place to get it noticed.

Questionable haircut.

I like the haircut. And the statement. Charlie is wrong. Obviously there is a substitute for the national anthem. Rene provided one.

This is an example of what I've been predicting for a while now.

Time for my prediction, natch:

The former US will consist of at least three separate countries by 2010.

kim weston


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGWsqR6UbGk

Any video yet? I would like to hear that rendition.

Then again, I'm trying to set Stephanie Millers' "You're A Lying Sack of Crap" to the tune of "Amazing Grace", so...

People don't know jack shit about the Negro/Black National Anthem and why it was written -- and by whom -- in the first place.

I bet they even think it was written "in the 60s".

f'n idiots in this country.

AHHHHHhhhhh - I WANNA HEAR IT

I agree w/ you - effin' idiots, starting in 2000.

LOL if she's still doing listener send-ins when she's back from vacation, I just might do it. It's actually pretty hilarious. And of course I'll have to do a Kansas/Carry On Wayward Son version lol

Did you hear the Doors and Stevie Wonder versions? LOL!

Uninterrupted Singing

You're welcome.

Nobody told me there was a Black National Anthem. How does it go?
Is it song to the tune of "To Anacreon in Heaven" or does it have a Motown flavor? Hip-Hop?

I heard it on Frangela this am, and I thought it was way cool, and that took some guts to do. Especially without telling them what she was gonna do, way to girl!

No, all wrong. Written by James Weldon Johnson and brother Rosamond, originally called the Negro National Anthem, 1900. Not Motown, not rap, not funk, not hard bop or swing or any of that.

Every Black musician in the US knows it, I'm certain.

http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/g_l...son/johnson.htm

I'll find you a really good version of it.

Tennessee State University Choir

No year given, but this is a pretty standard traditional arrangement.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=UYd_qWXB-4A&feature=related

You can hear this arrangement with similar voices in any high Baptist or AME church especially during the month of February.



LEVAS is a show-stopper, typically reserved for the 2nd to last or last song of a spirituals or Black chorus ensemble. Never fails to bring the house down, 108 years later.

That's it. The next time I'm asked to do the National Anthem, I'm going to belt out either "We Are Family" or "I Will Survive."

Neither of those have the same effect as "Lift Evry Voice and Sing".

If I have to sing it, I will belt out "I'd like to teach the world to sing" But I prefer RC Cola and a moonpie!!!

My chapter on Kim Weston is called, "How did a Pentecostal girl like you get an AME voice like that"? I think you have to be Black to get the humor, but whatever, that's my audience.

This performance was part of a come-back after Motown treated her like crud.

Kim Weston is one of my all-time faves...totally underrated, virtually unknown.

I've never heard of it so don't be so certain.
Must not have been very popular in NYC.
I'll learn it if you think it's worth the trouble.
I can fake it if you hum a few bars.

I was first introduced to it watching a rented blaxploitation flick while in the Army. My roommates at the time asked me, if I'd ever heard the song before. I told them I had not and didn't know what it was, but I thought it was fantastic. It was then that they told me that is was known as the Black National Anthem.

It's still moving.

Oh man, that's fantastic.

But it doesn't beat the best version of the Star Spangled Banner I've ever heard, which was by Whitney Houston in 1991.

Ray Charles's was great too, but dang, Whitney really tore it up.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5GSxSmYvME

Ok we'll change that to every Black church musician.

I love it when someone stick it to the man, but I really don't want to see this get blown out of proportion by the main stream media.

Excellent

I remember this. Whitney actually made that POS song tolerable. I wish America had a better national anthem.

Ok well I'll say it. I think it was a rotton thing to do. We have one national anthem. I'm not crazy about it (I'd prefer G-d Bless America or America the beautiful), but it's the anthem. When you're given the honor to sing it, you don't sing something else.

Bingo.

I'll bet Rene Marie will never again be invited to sing the National Anthem.

We have two or more Americas. We have two or more national anthems. Sing whichever one you like.

There is one United States of America last time I looked and one official anthem. No matter how many differences we have, we are ONE nation and we have ONE anthem.

I'm from California; we're never truly included in the US, so please understand if I'm not too enthusiastic or concerned about it. Frankly, if the US disappeared tomorrow, we Californians might not even notice for a few days (when the forest fire smoke clears). I think it's cool that people have the freedom to sing whatever anthem they want.

So then would it be safe to assume you wouldn't mind going into a restaurant and taking whatever the waiter decided to bring you, rather than what you ordered?

u mean one of The Blacks tm

I'm not but I got it

I dig the whole wattstax vid Think i was like 2 at the time

If I ordered apples and the waiter brought oranges, I wouldn't mind too much

I digress, but I actually do this occasionally - I allow the chef to choose and cook whatever he wants for me. San Francisco has the best food on the planet (sorry Paris) and you can't go wrong doing this very thing in SF.

Really, does it matter so much? We have already apparently abandoned respect for anthems when we removed the best anthem ever: Take Me Out to the Ball Game during the seventh-inning stretch. Given this precedent, I can't defend keeping the current POS as an anthem - replace it - I won't miss it at all.

Where I'm going with this is the honoring of a commitment.

If I as a waiter commit to bring you a steak, then I need to honor that commitment if I wish to remain employed.

In terms of Rene Marie, she committed to singing the National Anthem. She didn't honor that commitment and will likely not be asked again to perform in that type of a setting.

Oh committment... as in "I swear to uphold and defend the Constitution...." I totally get it now....

If you can't commit, you shouldn't be employed in that capacity. I totally get it now.... Let's all sing

THIS LAND IS YOUR LAND
words and music by Woody Guthrie

Chorus:
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California, to the New York Island
From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me

As I was walking a ribbon of highway
I saw above me an endless skyway
I saw below me a golden valley
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

I've roamed and rambled and I've followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
And all around me a voice was sounding
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

The sun comes shining as I was strolling
The wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
The fog was lifting a voice come chanting
This land was made for you and me

Chorus

As I was walkin' - I saw a sign there
And that sign said - no tress passin'
But on the other side .... it didn't say nothin!
Now that side was made for you and me!

Chorus

In the squares of the city - In the shadow of the steeple
Near the relief office - I see my people
And some are grumblin' and some are wonderin'
If this land's still made for you and me.



This totally beats "bombs bursting in air," doesn't it?

I think you may have missed a couple of lines at the end.... does anyone know how to contact this woman? since the NAACP's convention will be here in klancinnati, I want to see if we can get her to perform it here....


agreed.... when I attend black college football games, depending on the game, usually both songs are sung....

The shits corny! We're talkin' L7'sville Daddy Oh!

Personally I think that The Star Spangled Banner is only done justice when played by a full orchestra or marching band. I've never heard a human voice match them. So far as a national anthem goes if it were up to me it would be one of the following which both speak to freedom and liberty, plus a shared love of country and what it stands for.

America (My Country, 'Tis of Thee)
"My country,' tis of thee,
sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing;
and where my fathers died,
land of the pilgrims' pride,
from every mountainside let freedom ring!

My native country, thee,
land of the noble free, thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills,
thy woods and templed hills;
my heart with rapture thrills, like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
and ring from all the trees sweet freedom's song;
let mortal tongues awake;
let all that breathe partake;
let rocks their silence break, the sound prolong.

Our fathers' God, to thee,
author of liberty, to thee we sing;
long may our land be bright
with freedom's holy light;
protect us by thy might, great God, our King."

Or....

America the Beautiful
"O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!

America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassion'd stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness.

America! America!
God mend thine ev'ry flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law.

O beautiful for heroes prov'd
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life.

America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness,
And ev'ry gain divine.

O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears.

America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea."

Don't forget this.
I know she's Canadian, but I think it's beautiful:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LSarhZpnMs

Then again, when one hears this, it screams changing out anthem:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KN1b6QcYQ8s

But I must admit, I'll never forget this version of our Anthem. Wonderful.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qciWEufZ2xA

She'll no doubt be crushed.

What did that mean?

Which lines were those?

God of our weary years, God of our silent tears,
Thou who hast brought us thus far on the way;
Thou who hast by Thy might, led us into the light,
Keep us forever in the path, we pray.
Lest our feet stray from the places, our God, where we met Thee.
Lest our hearts, drunk with the wine of the world, we forget Thee.
Shadowed beneath Thy hand, may we forever stand,
True to our God, true to our native land.

Yeah, I didn't leave those words out, though.

carmen - when will I get to hear "Lying Sack of Crap?"

I might put it on my cellphone ringtones.

I didn't know that song was considered the Black National Anthem. I sang that a lot back in middle school. Of course, my being white made me a minority at the school, a big shift from my WASP-y upbringing up until 5th grade.

I didn't realize how subtle you can teach racism to someone until I found out in 1990 about Martin Luther King Jr., and that he was the reason we had a holiday from school in January. I kid you not, between kindergarden and halfway through the 5th grade, I thought the holiday was for President's Day or something.

I'm loving the folks getting bent out of shape about this. It let;s me point out that the National Anthem stole it's music from a drinking song.

Then I can use the My Country 'Tis of Thee/God Save the King/Queen theft as a juxtaposition.

Nothing. Just being silly.

Back to topic: the current anthem was adopted by Congressional resolution in 1931, so for most of US history there WAS no official anthem.

I think there are so many better songs than a militant version of "The Anacreontic Song."

We're a rather creative bunch of folks and it would take little to come up with something far better.

At least she sang what she was suppose to. But I prefer it with out music as HERE

Give me some Woody Guthrie for the national anthem.