Whitney Houston

Whitney Houston – National Anthem (Star Spangled Banner) 4K Remaster

Great job with this, the remaster brought to life this gem of music that is good enough reason for the planet to have evolved us. @Whitney Houston Remastered, I Wish you would have acknowledged the person most responsible for this performance’s amazing different sound, and deeper effect: arranger John Clayton. A jazz bassist who became an arranger, Whitney had just started working with him when she got the call to do the Super Bowl SSB, and she insisted on him. In 1992 black people were just becoming forward in the dominant white culture in the USA, and John, a black man, had not seen any black men before him have an arranging gig anywhere near that huge Usually the arrangement of the SSB sticks to 19th century harmony but John came from Jazz, the most American of art forms, and added dissonances gleaned from 20th century classical music and Stan Kenton arrangements. But as revolutionary as that was, his real genius move that changed everything is that the national anthem is a song in 3/4 time. John wrote this one in 4/4, and it had never been done that way before or and hasn’t since (outside of anywhere I happen to be playing piano when the SSB is called for). It was a brilliant, radical and bold “Of course” sound that is the most genius of things because:P no. one. ever.notices (you didn’t until now I’d bet). This unnoticeable but radical move gave that tight-ass 17th century English back-country reel a complete makeover into an American sound, while it also gave whitney one extra beat per measure to widen her vibrato and resonate those glorious long notes or stick in that additional whistle-voice flourish on the word “free”, and gave John Clayton an extra beat to stick in those startling and gorgeous substitute jazz chord changes that fit into 4/4 more naturally anyway, that together make this the most American of arrangements, and give it the fresh, and uniquely better sound this SSB has. John Clayton. Face it, ¾ is more corny, and modern American music is all in 4. Plus, WHITNEY, best singer on the planet at the time, going all in – no other SSB comes close. Holy crap. I’m a professional musician and huge music snob, and I STILL get goosebumps and tear up nearly every time, and I watch it several times per year certainly.

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