Kate, Irving, Thanks

A friend recently sent me a video celebration of the 4th of July replete with the flag waving, scenic icons of American patriotism, including the New York skyline, gap toothed of course, and the nearby Statue of Liberty, bought, we recently forgot, with the accumulated pennies of French school children.

It was a perfectly acceptable, perfectly ordinary, forgettable bit of YouTube. In the background, though, a simple melody played in a slow, overly reverential tempo which invoked a powerful memory from my childhood, which may be one of those "recovered" types that only maybe happened the way you remember it.

We – Mother, Father, me -- were laying about the living room half listening to the Kate Smith show on radio and half heard her say, "I have a new song that you all are gonna really like.  It's by Irving Berlin."

Then she sang:

“While the storm clouds gather

Far across the sea

Let us swear allegiance

To a land that's free."

In November, 1938, the clouds of war were indeed forming over Europe. Kate had asked if Irving had a patriotic song she could sing on her 20th anniversary Armistice Day show. He found one he wrote 20 years before for the hit army review "Yip Yip Yaphank," circa WW I, but didn’t for some reason use. (This memory fragment recovered courtesy Wikipedia).

These days we usually skip the verse, but I suspect it was those opening words that first caught the country's attention because they were a perfect fit for its mood; anxious, still isolationist, but conscious of a growing peril. I was only eight but a mother's imagination had me in uniform and under fire already.

"Let us all be grateful

For a land so fair

As we raise our voices

In a solemn prayer."

Kate sang the verse slowly, softly, clearly. Then, raising her voice and picking up the tempo, she electrified us forever with a ringing rendition of that climactic chorus we all know so well. It's a rare privilege to own such a memory and I hope it's true.

It’s the evening of the 4th right now, and the fireworks are glorious in high definition. New York’s celebration is winding down; the national capitol broadcast concluded some moments ago; Boston is next.. Music is the fireworks’ constant companion, but national anthem performances are perfuctory, sung not well by contemporary vocalists.

There’s no question what the People’s Anthem is. The crowds sing along invited or not. Thanks, Irving and Kate, for "God Bless America."