No doubt about it, music plays a vital role in everyone’s life. And the same can be said about its role in the socio-political realm. There’s just something about the harmonious chords of a well-known patriotic song that draws in Americans folks from all walks of life. It has the power to bring people together in times of national trouble (remember the patriotic surge in the months following Sept. 11?), and it can evoke a sense of pride in even the most cynical countrymen.

In light of this, here’s a historical look at five of America’s most popular patriotic songs:


“The Star-Spangled Banner”

In 1814, after witnessing the Royal Navy’s failure to capture Baltimore’s Fort McHenry during the War of 1812, amateur poet Francis Scott Key was inspired to write his famous poem about “the rockets’ red glare” and those “bombs bursting in air.” The poem was a tribute to the still-standing American flag and the resiliency of those fighting at the Chesapeake Bay stronghold. (At the time of the bombardment, Key was detained aboard a British ship.) As the story goes, Key later set his “Defense of Fort McHenry” to a popular British drinking song, “The Anacreontic Song,” which was already a well-known song in the states. (The Library of Congress, though, claims that there is little evidence to support this, that it is only a legend.) Containing a total of four stanzas, only the first is used today, though the fourth is usually tacked on for formal occasions. In 1889, the Navy first officially used the song, which Key later renamed as “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and during his presidency, Woodrow Wilson requested it be played whenever a national anthem was appropriate. On March 3, 1931, a congressional resolution signed by President Herbert Hoover designated “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the United States’ national anthem.


“America the Beautiful”

It all started with a trip to Colorado’s Pikes Peak in 1893. “It was then and there, as (Wellesley College English professor Katharine Lee Bates) was looking out over the sea-like expanse of fertile country spreading away so far under those ample skies, that the opening lines of the hymn floated into (her) mind,” according to the Library of Congress’ description of the song. The poem made its public debut on July 4, 1895, in the weekly publication The Congregationalist. For many years, “America the Beautiful” was sung to whichever popular folk tune the lyrics fit or whichever song those singing it felt compelled to use. Today, however, the song is sung to a piece written by church organist and choirmaster Samuel Augustus Ward.


“America” (“My Country ‘Tis of Thee”)

As the Library of Congress likes to tell it, “America” (more commonly referred to as “My Country ‘Tis of Thee”) is a bit of a mystery. Besides knowing that the Rev. Samuel Francis Smith wrote the lyrics, the origin of the song’s melody and the history of its verses are still relatively unknown. Others, such as Henry Carey, a British singer-composer, claim the song was originally composed as “God Save Great George the King” in London in 1740. What is known is that the melody for the song was first printed in England in a 1744 tune book called “Thesaurus Musicus.” Smith wrote the words while studying at Andover Theological Seminary in 1831. While there, organist and composer Lowell Mason asked him to either translate some German music books or write new words for the songs. Smith chose the latter and wrote lyrics to one tune in particular (apparently he was unaware that the song had the same melody as “God Save the King”). The song was first heard in public on July 4, 1831, at a children’s service at Boston’s Park Street Church.


“God Bless America”

If it wasn’t for Irving Berlin’s comedy revue “Yip, Yip, Yaphank,” written while the well-known composer was serving in the U.S. Army, America’s so-called second national anthem may not be in existence today. In 1918, while stationed at Camp Upton in Yaphank, New York, Berlin wrote the comedy to both raise funds and Army morale. But the solemn “God Bless America” was ill fitted for the rousing musical, so it was filed away, only to surface 20 years later as Berlin (the composer, not the city) began work on a peace song. After a three-day revision process, singer Kate Smith sang the patriotic song on her CBS radio show, which was broadcast from the New York World Fair on Nov. 10, 1938, to commemorate Armistice Day. The song was a hit. Some petitioned to have the song made the national anthem, and it drew in lots of money, which Berlin eventually donated to the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of America.


“This Land Is Your Land”

“God Bless America” may be America’s beloved second national anthem, but for singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie it was anything but a blessing. He disliked the song so much, in fact, that he wrote “This Land Is Your Land” (originally titled “God Blessed America For Me”) in a sort of protest against Berlin’s anthem. (Guthrie’s song, it should be noted, has also been proposed as a national anthem.) For Guthrie, a man who grew up in rural Oklahoma during the Great Depression and traversed the country in a sort of hobo-like existence, Berlin’s song “glossed over the lop-sided distribution of land and wealth that he was observing and had experienced as a child,” according the Library of Congress. It didn’t fully address what Guthrie so admired about America: the diversity of its everyday people. Thus his song was an attempt to highlight and celebrate