Some music for the Fourth of July, one of our loveliest patriotic songs. Written in 1893 by Katharine Lee Bates, an instructor at Wellesley College, Massachusetts…
America the Beautiful
O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea! Overlaid pictures representing America
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassion’d stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness.America! America!
God mend thine ev’ry flaw,
Confirm thy soul in self-control,
Thy liberty in law.O beautiful for heroes prov’d
In liberating strife,
Who more than self their country loved,
And mercy more than life.America! America!
May God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness,
And ev’ry gain divine.O beautiful for patriot dream
That sees beyond the years
Thine alabaster cities gleam
Undimmed by human tears.America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea.
There’s so many fine versions on YouTube it’s hard to choose. Here’s Keb’ Mo’…
Recurring Nightmare 
They will never let schoolkids sing the ENTIRE Battle Hymn of the Republic because of some people who quake at the words “God” and “Christ” if only in a stirring song.
Kind of sad.
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Gosh, I really did consider whether or not to comment. It’s the 4th of July weekend, the weather has been terrific, we went to see fireworks last night….
In all, a nice, wholesome, family sort of weekend.
And then we get a complaint about how Christians are sooooo persecuted in this country.
Let me ask a hypothetical: how would you feel if your kids came home from school and said they had sung a song about Vishnu? Or Astarte?
Or Allah?
That is, your kids, in public school, had been required to stand up and sing the praises of Allah.
How would you feel about that?
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Last night I went to an Interdependence Day drum circle that was supposed to be at the Temple to Music in Roger Williams Park. When I got there some church had driven a sound truck over the grass and was creating a wall of sacred sound. We sat on the lawn some distance away and played our drums, viola, digiridoo and tambourines.
Maybe the church had reserved that space, I’m sure our group had not officially scheduled anything with the park.
Anyway, the Christians occupied the airwaves for quite a radius. As far as I could see their performers outnumbered their audience.
I’m glad the park is such a free and open space. As far as the Christians, no one released the lions from the zoo upon them and they made their joyful noise unpersecuted. Gods Bless America.
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klaus-how does singing the complete Battle Hymn of the Republic,a song that is part and parcel of our history equate with religious indoctrination?
Whether you like it or not there isn’t a whole lot of East Indian or Muslim material that is a part of our history.BTW schoolkids in California have been forced to be “Muslims” for a day as some sort of demented “diversity” program.Nothing wrong with that, is there?
You sound like one of those politically correct types who are constantly carping about things that are traditional.
As far as Roger Williams Park goes,it’s an open free space-bring bigger drums next time and maybe you can drive off those annoying Christian noise makers.
“Interdependence Day”-get real.
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