OPINION - Acadia Readers

COMMENTARY FROM ACADIA

This is my "rant" page. I have been on this planet long enough to have had a pretty wide band of experience. I'm going to give vent to some of those thoughts and feelings that I have about what happens in our culture, here in Maine as well as elsewhere. Dear Reader, you may not particularly like what I have to say, or the way I say it, and to you I extend my deepest wish that you will send me your email comments, the good, the bad, and the ugly. For without discourse and contrarian viewpoints what good are opinions? While I intend to be blunt...I am paying for this site afterall...I ask that you be civil. For without civil discourse what do we have? Anarchy comes to mind.

February 5, 2010: Not exactly a rant, but the new main image is the firery result of a spectacular winter sunset

.My Rant: Monday, February 7, 2011

Oh, I suppose it isn’t a big deal. We watched the Super Bowl with great expectations last night. We are serious football fans in this house and watch the big games even when the Patriots have lost. It was with great expectations that we watched the Steelers and the Packers square off.

In the earliest festivities we watched that first female singer wannabe stand in front of the huge audience and display what little breath control she had while struggling through something that was supposed to sound like “America, The Beautiful”.

“What is that squeaking sound she makes?” I asked.

My wife, who was a fine professional soprano in past years told me that it was the sound of a country music performer. “It’s the kind of sound they make when they are trying to convey some emotion.”

I wondered why that female couldn’t hold a note without interspersing it with odd grace notes and glissandos. “Country singer, huh?” I thought. “Maybe, but not MY country.”

So when Christina Aguilera stood up to sing the national anthem, we hit the mute button. That’s right: we missed her epic muffing of the words to the Star Spangled Banner. Probably that was a good thing. Had I heard it I might have pitched the remote through the television.

Why is it that so many professional singers, being paid considerably more than union scale, can’t get the words or melody to our national anthem correct? This happens more than rarely. Some over-hyped or perhaps drug hyped singing “artist” stands up in front of an audience that is world wide and screws up singing some patriotic American song or worse, The Star Spangled Banner.

I will claim to be a musician. I took music lessons myself for many, many years in my youth. I played in many different bands all the way up to the time I went on duty in the U.S. Air Force. I know a little bit about music. I will agree that the Star Spangled Banner is an odd piece of music and very difficult to perform. It requires from a singer more than an average range and considerable breath control to sing properly.

Christina Aguilera has neither breath control nor range. Apparently she cannot memorize lyrics either. It was surprising that she would stand up in front of a large audience without practicing, making sure and making sure again that the lyrics were firmly memorized. It is surprising that she didn’t have the professionalism stand there, microphone in hand, and just simply NAIL it instead of screwing it up.

As an American I am offended. It happens all too often and it shouldn’t. The national anthem has been endorsed over time with the blood and sacrifice of many Americans.
It is those endorsements over decades that enables Super Bowls to take place. It is that same sacrifice that gave Aguilera the opportunity to earn super pay for singing The Star Spangled Banner yesterday.

Aguilera and the promoters who put the Super Bowl half time show together should respect that


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