Jeannette Fang: The Star-Spangled Banner with Brilliant Variations

Our latest Poets & Patriots project video release features U-Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance pianist Jeannette Fang performing “The Star Spangled Banner with Brilliant Variations,” 1861 by Augusts Cull. Published at the outset of the Civil War by Horace Waters in New York City and distributed by Oliver Ditson & Co. of Boston,…

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199th Anniversary Guest Post: Our National Anthems — Author John Shaw

Everybody knows “The Star-Spangled Banner.” It’s our national anthem. We hear it when an American wins a gold medal at the Olympics; we sing it before major league sporting events. It’s almost as familiar as the flag that it’s about. Yet like a lot of familiar things, it has a complicated history, a lot of…

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Star Spangled Music Launches Fund & Friend Building Campaign

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: SUSAN KEY (310.748-3773) info@starspangledmusic.org Celebrating the National Anthem’s 200th Birthday with the gift of new tools for teachers… Star Spangled Music Foundation has launched a funding campaign to release set of historical recordings and musical songbook in anticipation of the bicentennial of “The Star-Spangled Banner” — the national anthem of the…

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Why Sing, Study, Teach & Learn the Banner? It's Who We Are!

On the occasion of the 199th birthday of the US national anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner,” I thought it’d be worth taking some time to reflect on the meaning of the song and specifically the question of why it’s important for K-12 education in the U.S.A. My students at the University of Michigan tease me a…

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Star Spangled Music Wins SAM "Sight & Sound" Grant

Musicologists Mark Clague of the University of Michigan and Susan Key of the Star Spangled Music Foundation were awarded the 2013 Sight and Sound Subvention from the Society for American Music on Saturday, March 10, 2013 for their project “Poets & Patriots: A Recorded History of ‘The Star Spangled Banner’” at the Society’s national meeting…

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A World Premiere Recording of "The Star-Spangled Banner"?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvVtFD9Na0I] It’s an audacious claim to offer the premiere recording of the United States National Anthem “The Star-Spangled Banner” in January 2013! Certainly, the song is already more than well known and often performed. It has been recorded by such vocal greats as operatic tenor John McCormack or soul superstar Whitney Houston. John Philip Sousa’s band recorded the…

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