Zooey Deschanel's National Anthem, Or How (Not) to Talk About a Performance

Two responses to Grantland's broadside against Zooey Deschanel's national anthem bring up a problem that confounds everyone concerned with analyzing music: the difference between a transitory live performance, where an audience measures success in that moment, using a set of expectations conditioned by context; and t a recording of the same event, a mediated experience that listeners experience individually, over and over again.

Jason Heid, on Dallas's D Magazine tells us what it was like to experience Deschanel's rendition at the game:

I was at Rangers Ballpark for Game 4 last night, and loved the sense of melancholy with which Deschanel infused the familiar song. It felt almost like a funeral dirge, and I mean that as a high compliment. It was quite different from what we normally get at these games: when some mid-level country music or top 40 star is trotted out for a serviceable, but instantly forgettable, performance. 

A reader of Andrew Sullivan's The Dish makes the point that the Deschanel version, as opposed to the much praised Whitney Houston's at the 1991 Super Bowl, was perfect to sing along with:

Zooey sang it like she meant it. Even the way she softened the ends of most of the lines gave the audience room to hear themselves singing along, and isn't that supposed to be the point?
Her job was not to deliver an aria to a silent hall; it was to lead the crowd in singing the song. 

However dramatic or pleasing Whitney Houston's rendition might have been, you can't sing along to it. you can only listen ... Singing the national anthem is supposed to be a participatory ritual, not a spectator sport. 

Is it fair, as Grantland did, to evaluate a live performance based on a video recording of it? Are Caspian-Kang and Vargas-Cooper (these are their names, really), and Jason Heid responding to the same thing at all? And do we really want to sing along?

It Wasn't as Bad as All That, Was It? Zooey Deschanel's National Anthem

Relax, guys. On Grantland, Jay Caspian-Kang and Natasha Vargas-Cooper rant over this:

Here's a sample:

Where have our divas gone? There is no strife in ZoZo’s lily-white aesthetic. No sex, no violence, just tweeting. What a tepid and sniveling symbol she is. She has nothing to draw on, nothing to find resonance in. She’s not even fit for our time. Give us a beleaguered icon. Someone trying to maintain their imperial draw even though they’ve grown bloated and waterlogged with age. I want to hear the sounds of a woman who has known loss and triumph, not the pubescent squeaks of a flinching sitcom star with cute bangs and a stupid blog. 

Very classy.

There have been far worse renditions of our national anthem, and many better. If you can stand reading their childish drivel, Caspian-Kang and Vargas-Cooper have their own best-of list.

Responses to NPR's Dropping World of Opera, Lisa Simeone Firing

A few responses to NPR dropping Lisa Simeone's World of Opera because of her involvement in organizing protests in DC, and her firing as host of Soundprint for the same reason:

• On his Baltimore Sun blog, David Zurawick says that NPR has a code of ethics and needs to enforce it.

• Libertarian website Reason thinks that the lengths NPR goes through to prove its objectivity only emphasizes its editorial bias; better just to acknowledge it and let its employees be Prius-driving, yoga-loving, liberal lunatics. 

• WDAV in Charlotte, which produces World of Opera, is sticking by Simeone. The station is keeping her as host, and will start distributing the show directly to stations beginning on November 11. WDAV blog commenters seem pleased. 

• James Fallows of the Atlantic has some responses from Davidson College alumni on WDAV's support for Simeone. (WDAV's studios are on the campus of the school.

• FAIR found her firing "absurd." 

On a related note, Michelle Norris, whose husband is now an Obama 2012 advisor, recently quit her job as All Things Considered host to avoid the appearance of conflict of interest.

Koyaanisqatsi and the "Crying Indian"

The so-called "crying Indian" ad is the most famous (or infamous) example of a patronizingly essentialist view of American Indians as environmental augurs:

I think Koyaanisqatsi is another. The only words you hear in the film are Hopi. Koyaanisqatsi means "life out of balance," and the chorus that is part of Philip Glass's score intones three tribal sayings that can be interpreted as being warnings about the impact of human actions on the world.

It's certainly not mean-spirited but can nonetheless be as limiting and de-humanizing as any cowboy-movie stereotype.

It's as if They Read My Mind

Look what was in my mail today:

I'll probably just stay home; I can watch the movie for free on YouTube. By the way, Philip Glass's 75th birthday is coming up on January 31, in case you're wondering why you're seeing so much of his music programmed this season.