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Jimi Hendrix - ' The Star Spangled Banner '

submitted by michie

1 decade 7 years 8 months ago

"The Star-Spangled Banner" is the national anthem of the United States of America, with lyrics written in 1814 by Francis Scott Key. Key, a 35-year-old lawyer and amateur poet, wrote them as a poem after seeing the bombardment of Fort McHenry in Baltimore, Maryland, by British ships in Chesapeake Bay during the War of 1812.

The poem, entitled "Defence of Fort McHenry," was set to the tune of the popular British drinking song "The Anacreontic Song", more commonly known by its first line, "To Anacreon in Heaven," and became a well-known American patriotic song. With a range of one and a half octaves, it is known for being notoriously difficult to sing. It was recognized for official use by the United States Navy (1889) and the White House (1916), and was made the national anthem by a Congressional resolution on 3 March 1931 (46 Stat. 1508, codified at 36 USC 301). Although the song has four stanzas, only the first is commonly sung today.

The controversial nature of Hendrix's style is epitomized in the sentiments expressed about his renditions of the "Star Spangled Banner", a tune he played loudly and sharply accompanied by simulated sounds of war (machine guns, bombs and screams) from his guitar. His impressionistic renditions have been described by some as anti-American mockery and by others a generation's statement on the unrest in U.S. society, oddly symbolic of the beauty, spontaneity, and tragedy endemic to Hendrix's life.

Hendrix claimed that he did not intend for his performance of the national anthem to be a political statement, that he simply intended it as a different interpretation of the anthem. When taken to task on the Dick Cavett Show regarding the "unorthodox" nature of his performance of the song at Woodstock, Hendrix replied, "I thought it was beautiful," which was greeted with applause from the audience. His later-career live favorite "Machine Gun" however, was clearly a protest song against war.

Woodstock was not the first time Hendrix played the Star Spangled Banner in concert. It was in fact a setlist staple from fall 1968 through the summer of 1970, and studio recordings of the song exist as well.