This is not the anthem I wanted.

(With apologies - or maybe thanks - to Tan Dun.)

Ok, fine, Renee Fleming did a bang-up job of singing the national anthem at the Super Bowl.  Given the parameters of the particular job. 

However.  This really is not the anthem I wanted to hear. 

The anthem I want to hear is when 4000 people in the Met auditorium stand up and sing it on opening night.  The anthem I want to hear is when 2800 people in the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion stand up and sing it.  Together.  When close to 18,000 people stand up and sing it in the Hollywood Bowl.  When 92,000 people stand up and sing it in Ohio Stadium.  That is a thrilling sound.

Not when some one person hired to jazz it up sings it for us.  Anymore it seems we hire out everything, even the singing of our national theme song, so to speak. 

A national anthem is intended to be a rallying cry of the people, not a set piece performed by a professional, don't try this at home.  Yes, ours is not easy to sing.  But then, neither is anything Andrew Lloyd Webber writes.  Or "happy birthday," for that matter.  And who really cares if all something-thousand people can or can not hit the high note?  People easily and naturally transpose down as needed.  It doesn't hurt the feeling created by all those people doing this one thing together.

Yes, the Star Spangled Banner was a drinking song, no doubt composed on a pub napkin.  Seems to me that suits the American way of life, no?  I think that hiring it out is symptomatic of a lot that is wrong in this country.  Because we don't feel "qualified" to sing our national anthem for ourselves anymore.  And there are so many other things where we no longer feel qualified to stand together.  We've hired it out.  And the results are ugly.  We have to live with them every day.