I like ours - 'God save the Queen' - the best. I used to think it was very mundane, & sprint out of cinemas to avoid it when I was young & callow. But I appreciate its solemn and stirring qualities now.
However, I do like the 'Marseillaise'. Not the words - they're horribly bloody - but the tune can't help but be rousing. Who can forget 'Casablanca'?
I like 'The Star-Spangled Banner' too, and especially the respectful way that Americans sing it.
This one is nice. So was the one used before that, during the apartheid era. It had a nice tune, but unfortunately some rather politically incorrect lyrics.
So eventually, to try accommodating everyone, the powers that be commissioned a hodgepodge mixture of the two anthems to be assimilated. The result is absolute torture and I refuse to learn it.
I'm one of the Americans that actually likes our national anthem (too hard to sing? cry me a river), but I think the best national anthem is that of the Russian Federation.
If it was written by the same man as Die Schöpfung and Die Jahreszeiten, it is bound to be good. I never understood why on Earth they would decide to cut it down to one third of the original.
I really like the Swedish one too.
And the Star-Spangled Banner. But "God Bless America" would be a better one, I think.
I like O Canada ;-) Actually, while Das Lied der Deutschen used to make me cringe, just a little, I have come to really love it, since I accidentally discovered it in it's original form by Haydn, String Quartet 62, when I bought the Takáks Quartet Op. 76 set about a year ago.
Not so I'm afraid. The original was a song Haydn wrote called Gott erhalte Franz der Kaiser, and was for & about the Holy Roman Emperor Francis 2. I've heard it & it's good. Haydn altered & re-used the melody in Op76 quartet & in the trumpet concerto.
A sort of national anthem that I love is The Internationale. I can't link to a youtube version, although there are plenty of them, because I'm in China, where the authorities have been blocking youtube for years. I can, however, get my Chinese family & friends to roar it out with gusto once I've primed them with enough drink, since they were forced to listen to it & learn it by heart at school.
Greece has the longest national anthem in the world. It has 158 stanzas, written by the poet Dionysios Solomos (although the cut-down version is shorter than Uruguay’s, which is more than five minutes long).
Growing up, I remember the Soviet national anthem being played at the end of the ice hockey world championships every year. And although forever linked in my memory to the Swedish team being mauled to pieces, it's still the most beautiful national anthem I've ever heard.
I have to agree - the Soviet anthem was the best of them all.
I have a very stirring version of it played by the BBC Symphony Orchestra under Barbirolli in Moscow in 1967. That was great!
I also like the Russian anthem the most - I was born in the Soviet Union, so I feel particularly patriotic when I hear it . But it's basically Pachelbel's Canon, isn't it?
I hate the British National Anthem (God Save The Queen). Let's face it, these first four words alone are problematic for any atheists and republicans, and the tune isn't very elegant.
As an Olympics fan for many decades, I became quite familiar with the Russian and East German national anthems, it would have been even more annoying them winning all those medals if they had lousy national anthems.
Is it true that when the Soviet Union collapsed they changed the national anthem, and then decided they'd like to keep the old one anyhow, on account of its great tune. (Perhaps someone will clarify).
Is it true that when the Soviet Union collapsed they changed the national anthem, and then decided they'd like to keep the old one anyhow, on account of its great tune. (Perhaps someone will clarify).
Indeed, the music is still the same; they only changed the lyrics in order to reflect the new policy (no more USSR, no more Lenin, no more Stalin, no more Red Banner and so on).
Maybe I will sound unpatriotic but I don't like the current Romania anthem, Desteapta-te, romane ("Awaken thee, Romanian!"). I liked the old one better, Trei culori ("Three Colors").
I'll admit to quite liking Advance Australia Fair. A solid day in the office for whoever wrote it in the 70s it's a bit paint by numbers but it has a solid tune, a bit of contrast, and it arranges well
When I joined the forum recently, I took a vow never to post negatively so I'll just say that I have never felt less patriotic than when I am obliged to hear our national anthem.
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