Hitting a little too close to home

[jducoeur]

I like the Fourth of July. I've enjoyed it for many years -- certainly since before the year that goldsquare and I camped out overnight to stake out primo space for the Barony in front of the Shell. And I know that, as the Boston celebration has grown and commercialized, it's lost a certain something. But this year -- this year kind of bugged me.

(Caveat: I was at the rehearsal yesterday, and caught the end of today's telecast. These impressions are composited from those parts.)

It was a bunch of little things that got to me. First, one of the anthems got an arrangement I can only describe as Disneyfied -- sweet, inoffensive and to my mind wholly inappropriate for patriotic music. It was a comfy musical blanket, lulling you to sleep. The tone was entirely wrong, to my mind. Patriotism is dangerous, dammit, and should always demand that you think about it. Anyone who paints it as safe and comfortable is deliberately handing a loaded shotgun to a five year old.

Then there were the guest performers. All perfectly decent but, y'know, three country music acts just doesn't exactly strike me as representative of Boston. This, more than anything I've seen before, drove home that this concert has now been carefully marketed for the national audience. Indeed, there was an odd note of, "Please don't hate us because we're a Blue State" echoing past me throughout the whole thing.

Finally, there was that atrocious medley they did at the end, grabbing "patriotic" phrases seemingly at random and smushing them together -- a stock phrase from the Constitution here, the beginning of the Pledge of Allegiance there, resulting in a sort of lumpy Patriotism Stew. I'm sure that the idea was to make it all super-patriotic, but instead they wound up with Nutrasweet Patriotism -- it sort of tastes right, but there's no substance to it and it leaves an unpleasant aftertaste. (And it's bad for you in large quantities.)

For all my cynicism, I consider myself a patriot, and take that seriously. But the past decade has made me very sensitive to the difference between patriotism and jingoism, and this evening's entertainment came just a step closer to that line than I like. In any other broadcast I would just shrug it off as the times, but this is *Boston*, dammit. This is my city, and a concert that has long been close to my heart. Those sour notes are harder to ignore when they're coming out of my home...

Comments

[cvirtue.livejournal.com]

Nutrasweet Patriotism

Some of the things you write (violent agreement, here) sound much like what you've said about the dumbing-down and friendlification of Masonry.

Not going anywhere with this, but it struck me as interesting.

[oakleaf-mirror.livejournal.com]

But as of last year, it's really not a Boston celebration anymore. Last year was the first year they went nationally on TV, and they made a number of changes to cater to a more generic audience. Not to sound like a curmudgeon, but it just isn't as good as it used to be. This isn't a local party anymore. It's a national TV event at the mercy of focus groups, and Nielson ratings, filmed before a live studio audience, only some of whom, like us, have noticed.

[goldsquare.livejournal.com]

Yup, exactly right. The Hatch Shell concert is dead, and useless, and a waste of time and space.

[cheshyre]

I thought it was national before; when I first came to Boston nearly 20 years ago, my parents were all psyched for me about the chance to see the Pops Concert on the 4th.
And I can remember seeing it on A&E in past years as well.

Still, I don't remember anything quite like this year with the commercial breaks (at least they played music during them. I liked hearing the Pops do "Charlie on th eMTA"

[oakleaf-mirror.livejournal.com]

It was nationally famous, before, but still locally run. A&E might have shown it, but they were presenting what was here. Last year, one of the major networks (CBS?) picked it up, and a lot of the money and decisions came from outside. They made a number of changes to cater to a national TV audience, rather than the people on the Esplanade.

[new-man.livejournal.com]

I'll agree with oakleafmirror that this is no longer Boston's party. The Pops describes itself over and over again as "America's Orchestra".

I don't particularly care for COuntry/Western music, but I have to say that their performance had more to do with the Fourht of July than David Lee Roth singing an anemic version of "Jump" last year. At least Rich, Ken, and Jennie Gsrth made an attempt to do something patriotic. One of the things I appreciated about their performance, which I think may have been lost on people who heard nothing but their genre and their accents (I'm not saying this of you, by the way) was their message was a very un-Red state one of "Love everyone". They said it explicitly several times (I think it's their catch phrase), and the 'patriot stew' including quotes from MLK's "I have a Dream" speech, as well as "...all men are created equal" from the Delcaration of Independence. They could have selected "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" or "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed", but they didn't. I think as far as performers trying to appeal to as wide an audience as possible, I'd much rather see the liberals from the South that the presented, than conservatives from the Northeast.

[matildalucet.livejournal.com]

I like a lot of country music and it does have a local fan base, but three guest acts of any genre sounds unbalanced to me. I want a mixture of stuff I like, stuff I don't like so I can go to the bathroom, stuff I don't know if I like or not yet. The Pops didn't ask my opinion, though.

[cheshyre]

Well, despite the separate listings in the program, I got the impression that the three acts were mostly performing in one group for the "Our America" number. So two official numbers, plus whatever it was they did during the commercial break.

It wasn't the country

[marysdress.livejournal.com]

Don't get me started about the concert last night. Too late, I've started.

First, let me make an argument for why I would toss the country singers out as a serious issue. Country is becoming a New England thing. I suspect you'll find attendance at what are now a considerable number of country music concerts far outstripping attendance at any folk concerts shy of the Newport Folk Festival. We wouldn't think twice about a folk performer on stage. Country isn't a southern thing anymore.

That said, last night's performers were not representative of mainstream country. They are by Nashville standards outsiders and the outlaws of their generation. Cowboy Troy is a black country rap artist. Come on. Country artists are white, they don't rap and they don't preach love, peace and acceptance - which is what Big and Rich are about.

If they were pandering solely to the national audience, they'd have had Gretchen Wilson sing instead of Big and Rich, who haven't had near the hits she has. If they were pandering to the red states, they'd have invited someone mainstream country. I'm not sure why they picked that group of performers except that Gretchen Wilson has a set of pipes almost as good as Patsy Cline's with Loretta Lynn's sense of humor - but they didn't use her. Presumably it was because of the patriotic piece they're releasing.

I didn't have a problem with the piece they did, which was actually mostly the pledge of allegiance. It highlighted the inclusiveness of those documents, and inclusiveness is something their music emphasizes. Something that this country could use smacked upside its head.

Here's what I think the problem was. The Pops concert has too many ads and is now split into two concerts - the local one and then the national one. What the heck is the 1812 overture doing in the middle of the concert? And how about all those commercial breaks? Plus this is the Pops - guest stars get more than 2 songs - but with all those commercials, who has time? You can't put them on until you've gone national, at which point you have to fit them, a sing-a-long, plus Stars and Stripes forever into a half hour plus commercials. There's no time left.

Too many commercials; the order was off; the content was too changed; and didn't they used to ring the church bells of Boston for the 1812? Maybe 10pm is too late? The concert is too late and so are the fireworks, but it's for the national television audience.

grump grump grump. There, I'm done.

Re: It wasn't the country

[marysdress.livejournal.com]

Rephrase - highlighted the inclusiveness of the things said in those other documents.

Re: It wasn't the country

[cheshyre]

I heard the churchbells. Somehow, where I was sitting, I couldn't hear the big guns in 1812 (maybe I was too close to the fireworks) but I was listening for and heard the bells.

Re: It wasn't the country

[marysdress.livejournal.com]

They didn't show the bellringing on television - just the guns. Couldn't hear them either.

[pamelina.livejournal.com]

I thought the same things you did, but with a more cynical shrug about it.