The Power of a Song

“I was never more aware of the power of our national anthem than in November of 2003, when I was invited to sing the Star-Spangled Banner to open a Celtics game against the Chicago Bulls. Allowed to practice beforehand, I walked onto the basketball floor of the Fleet Center, was given a mike and told to go ahead and warm up. But the entire roster of the Chicago Bulls and the Boston Celtics were also on the court warming up! The moment I started to sing, all motion ceased, and these incredible, legendary athletes silently bowed their heads, basketballs in hand, until I finished. That is one powerful song. I felt the power of the song in that moment and it is something I will never forget.”

Patty Clark, lower school music teacher, was invited this summer to give a sermon at the First Church in Swampscott, where she is the Director of Music Ministries. Instead of following her initial instinct to lead her congregation in a hymn sing, she took the opportunity to speak about something she has come to understand deeply, both personally and professionally, the power of a song. In her sermon, she discusses the history of our national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner,” and the concurrent history of a lesser-known song recently brought into the spotlight by the National Football League when they announced it would be played this season ahead of every season-opener, “Lift Every Voice and Sing.”

“Our national anthem is a powerful song, and it’s a powerful symbol. And I think of this when I consider the fact that it’s being paired with “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” a song that is sometimes called the Black national anthem, a song considered as a hymn by its creators, a song that has a long, storied and powerful history, a song that’s #631 in our hymnal… Rising out of the incredible history of slavery’s terror and ugliness, rose these incredible lyrics of beauty and faith. That’s all expressed in this powerful song.”

An arrangement of the song, as performed by “Committed,” an acapella men’s group.