God save the Queen !

[Gordon]

Jerusalem is still widely viewed as the top choice for a replacement. The one problem, its reference to only one part of the UK, could be solved I suppose by re-wording that particular line: "In our just green and pleasant land".

Doesn't "Jerusalem" fall at the first fence!! The Parry tune is fine but the sentiment of Blake's verse is somewhat Victorian and presumptuous in a multicultural society. Anyway we need to add a few more lines to suggest that Mohammed paid us a visit too on his way to Medina, not to mention Buddha. And that sword that doesn't sleep in my hand sounds a bit, well, militaristic, however symbolic it may have been meant? Some people are so literal these days, no souls.

[Gordon]

Quote Originally Posted by ahinton: So you'd not advocate that Australia adopt Arrival platform humlet as its National Anthem, then?...

I don't think so, no. You could ask Gordon what he thinks about that idea.

Doh!! I must have missed something in translation. Wonder what Queensland's state anthem is? Or New South Wales's for that matter?

PS: EDIT: Ah!! so THIS is what you mean!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2gMjtlYthk

Eminently singable at a rugby match after a few amber nectars!!

[Quarky]

Don't take this too seriously folks, but would you sing it if (a) you didn't believe in God and (b) you disapproved of the Monarchy ?
I would (a) because I'm a hypocrite and (b) because I like a good mass sing-song...be it Jerusalem or The Mayor of Bayswater.

Great question, adcarp. Certainly made me think about the meaning of the phrase. "God save" is not mentioned in my concise OD, although many other phrases including "God" are. Could have a variety of meanings.

God save me - a plea for help when things go wrong.

God Save Jeremy - because maybe nothing else will?

God Save the Queen? Apparently nothing to do with the Queen being the head of the Anglican Church, something inherited from Henry VIII, I believe .

The Urban Dictionary has a variety of meanings, but hasn't settled on a single one.

Yahoo best answer: " It's just a prayer to god that the Queen (of England) should have a long life".

So it seems it means "May you have a long life". I don't think it is necessary to believe in a Christian God, nor to be a monarchist, in order to wish someone a long life.

But as has been pointed out, to sing lyrics, does not necessarily mean that you believe in the sentiment expressed - any musician knows that. And maybe the converse also applies.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Blake's verse is somewhat Victorian

Which is quite impressive when you consider he died ten years before Victoria became our gracious Queen.

[Gordon]

Which is quite impressive when you consider he died ten years before Victoria became our gracious Queen.

Frustrate your knavish tricks!! The verse didn't die in 1827.

Well he was nothing if not a visionary and a touch before his time. Anyway, you don't have to be a Victorian to be a Victorian. There's that pub in the East End - and was Albert really that Square, even if he was a Mason?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Thinking about the Masonic connection, surely it should be "Albert Triangle (with an Eye in it)"?

[ardcarp]

Messing with William Blake's text? Never

Oh dear yes, the PC text messers. I cringe every time I hear the English Hymnal version of Bunyan's Who would true valour see. No lions or hobgoblins and the person changed from third to first. So nanny-ish and nit-picking. Mind you, it's a cracking tune...trad English realised by RVW...a candidate for a National Anthem?

[Gordon]

Thinking about the Masonic connection, surely it should be "Albert Triangle (with an Eye in it)"?

Yup! let the side down there! They don't get cornea than that!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

[MrGongGong]

Bunyan's Who would true valour see.

That's the one about this chap isn't it?

[Gordon]

True valour? That'll make Victoria Cross.

[ahinton]

Hinty, go back to your own country, if you don't like it

I don't know who "Hinty" is (is he some kind of typo corrpution for the English novelist George Alfred Henty [1832-1902]? - if so, different country to mine, obviously!); that said, I've written nothing about what I might specifically "like" - or "dislike" - about the notion of having and maintaining a UK National Anthem beyond questioning whether UK or any other country - including my own if, after a second attempt, it does succeed in securing "independence" from the remainder of UK - actually needs one at all. Yes, I loathe the boring tune for the present UK National Anthem, as evidently do quite a few others - and I don't think that the words for it are anything like as good as they could be - but the extent of my interest in the subject as a whole is insufficient to determine that I "don't like it" in the sense that I could care that much less about it, for all that (as you will doubtless have noticed) I do not find the subject uninteresting.

[ahinton]

Doh!! I must have missed something in translation. Wonder what Queensland's state anthem is? Or New South Wales's for that matter?

PS: EDIT: Ah!! so THIS is what you mean!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2gMjtlYthk

Eminently singable at a rugby match after a few amber nectars!!

Yes, indeed - you got it! In a nutshell has, however, to be heard in its entirety to be fully appreciated.

[ahinton]

D'ya know, I really do hope tht Her Majesty the Queen IS reading this thread. I gather that, as a more accomplished mimic than her eldest son (who's apparently not too bad at it himself), she's not exactly unknown for a wacky sense of humour...

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Familiarity with a tune may breed contempt, but if it were not our national anthem, but a minuet by Purcell, played by a baroque ensemble in HIPP style, I'm sure many of its current detractors would be singing its praises.