what's your favorite national anthem?

[Mozart]

http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/X2S4mWDD--0

[jochanaan]

My favorite national anthem(s)?  All the ones I haven't had to play!

[Gustav]

i always wonder, which national anthems are the most difficult to sing?

[jochanaan]

i always wonder, which national anthems are the most difficult to sing?

I believe good ol' Star-Spangled is among the hardest, with its wide range and low start.

[Wanderer]

Not meaning to sound too patriotic, I am quite fond of the Greek national anthem. 

[Que]

http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/X2S4mWDD--0

That pretty bad, actually. Music is lousy, the belligerent lyrics even worse!  
(Don't know why they like war that much, they mainly lost them)

Q

[Mozart]

That pretty bad, actually. Music is lousy, the belligerent lyrics even worse!  
(Don't know why they like war that much, they mainly lost them)

Q

Haha it is because when I was younger I would go to Mexico because the drinking age is 18. And at midnight and 6 am they would play it so it got stuck in my head

[M forever]

That pretty bad, actually. Music is lousy, the belligerent lyrics even worse!  
(Don't know why they like war that much, they mainly lost them)

Q

Indeed, it sounds like from some really bad Italian opera. Same about the Greek anthem, BTW, so I think

Not meaning to sound too patriotic, I am quite fond of the Greek national anthem. 

Wanderer must be kidding. A real pity because there is so much great Greek music, but that sounds like some really bad march from an operetta.

[Wanderer]

that sounds like some really bad march from an operetta.

It's quite banal, for sure.

[PSmith08]

On musical terms, I am fond of Auferstanden aus Ruinen, the anthem of the former DDR. It's not too complicated and it has, despite the general unpleasantness of the Communist regime, nice-enough lyrics. Indeed, it's almost aggressively nice and polite.

[Sergeant Rock]

On musical terms, I am fond of Auferstanden aus Ruinen, the anthem of the former DDR. It's not too complicated and it has...nice-enough lyrics.

Here's a translation for the non-German speakers:

Hail, hail East Germany
Land of fruit and grape
Land where you'll regret
If you try to escape
No matter if you tunnel under or take a running jump at the wall
Forget it, the guards will kill you, if the electrified fence doesn't first.


Sarge

[MN Dave]

Here's a translation for the non-German speakers:

Hail, hail East Germany
Land of fruit and grape
Land where you'll regret
If you try to escape
No matter if you tunnel under or take a running jump at the wall
Forget it, the guards will kill you, if the electrified fence doesn't first.


Sarge

[PSmith08]

Here's a translation for the non-German speakers:

Hail, hail East Germany
Land of fruit and grape
Land where you'll regret
If you try to escape
No matter if you tunnel under or take a running jump at the wall
Forget it, the guards will kill you, if the electrified fence doesn't first.


Sarge

I don't offer any editorial comment on the DDR, other than to say that their national anthem wasn't bad.

[Norbeone]

The old Soviet National Anthem has always been a favourite of mine. Very rousing stuff!

[Iconito]

That pretty bad, actually. Music is lousy, the belligerent lyrics even worse!  
(Don't know why they like war that much, they mainly lost them)

Q

What counts is not the quality of the text, but the authenticity of the text and song taken together and that they have some real connection to events or situations which are relevant and/or decisive in the history of the given country.

Exactly. And most South American anthems come from the times when those countries were fighting for their independence from Spain, hence the "belligerent lyrics" that Que (and most reasonable people nowadays) finds so funny.

Take the Argentine National Anthem as another example. The modern version  is quite discrete, but the original version is a bloodbath...

As for the music, among the many versions I found in youtube (ranging from rock covers to solo harmonica...), this is the closest to a decent one (although the military band and lousy choir seem to be unavoidable...)

http://www.youtube.com/watch/v/1BJPW8YmP_U

[ChamberNut]

I love the Russian National Anthem.

And although being Canadian, we might just have the most boring National Anthem and flag.  Of course, that's just my opinion.   

Otherwise, I am a proud Canadian. 

[Kullervo]

In first grade my class did a project on world nations. We would have to make a presentation using things related to our assigned country. My country was Italy, and as part of my project, I brought in a taped recording (of a midi version from a computer encyclopedia ) of the national anthem. I haven't heard it since then but I can still hum it.

[(poco) Sforzando]

One interesting thing about La Marseillaise is that none of its phrases is self-repeating (unlike, say, the anthem for Italy, where it seems almost all of its phrases are self-repeating). This feature has made the French anthem rather difficult for me to memorize, and I sometimes wonder how the French do it. I'm not kidding; I find it easier to memorize something like Wir arme Leut from Wozzeck than the French national anthem.

[max]

No one mentioned the National Anthem of Wales "Land of my Father's" especially as sung by Bryn Terfel definitely among the top ten!

[M forever]

Wales has a national anthem? And why is it sung in English then?