When Terrace Park School Choir singing the “The Star Spangled Banner” started things off, I sat and listened. When the show ended with everyone there, performers and performed for, standing and waving American flags and singing the “Star Spangled Banner,” I stood, waved and sang along. Same “Star Spangled Banner” before and after, but something had changed. I had heard what our national anthem means to me.
It wasn’t that Sno-King Chorale’s “Salute to America” this past Veteran’s Day was a neatly polished, tightly organized concert. It was all over the boards.
Michael Denton’s narrating of “The American Creed” as accompanied by the Chorale was a stirring recitation of our fundamental beliefs as Americans.
Frank DeMiero’s conducting of Lionel Richie and Michael Jackson’s “We are the World” as accompanied by the Terrace Park kids voiced our growing awareness of our global connection with other peoples.
Lutkin’s “The Lord Bless You and Keep You” wove our majority belief in a higher power into the national character.
The Chorale’s version of “And Wherever You Go” showcased the reason why Sno-King will perform at Carnegie Hall this upcoming Jan. 17. These folks are first rate.
Shoreline Community Band, Ken Noreen conducting, contributed excerpts from our nation’s past: Grundman’s “Second American Rhapsody;” Bernstein, Sondheim and Duthoit’s “West Side Story;” and “How the West Was Won.”
Selections from the “American Song Book,” “I Hear America Singing” and the “Armed Forces Pride of America” rounded out the variety of sentiments that form our sensibility.
Emcee Dave Dolacky, and local radio personality from the 1960s era Frosty Fowler, spiced things up with anecdotes from the past and respectful recognition of local vets, many of them in attendance. Mention of our men in uniform now was made; but the emphasis here as well as everywhere else was on the past.
I can’t say I didn’t have a problem with relevance. The program was focused on vets from WWI, WWII, Korea and Vietnam. The music and the talk was mostly about our national experience, emphasis on the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s.
So what, I was half-talking to myself off and on during the performance, what difference did this show make to me now?
The answer came last, when the performance was ending and I was standing along with everybody else at Edmonds Center for the Arts, waving an American flag and singing the “Star Spangled Banner.”
Sno-King Chorale’s “Salute to America” put me in touch with who I am. I am an American.
Reactions? Comments? E-mail Dale Burrows at grayghost7@comcast.net
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