Land Of Hope And Glory.

[Jim Brady]

I've just watched Last Night at the Proms and Land of Hope and Glory really gets the audience carried away and sing with great gusto.A BBC poll taken a couple of years ago came up with a result that 55% of the population would prefer this as the National Anthem rather than God Save The Queen I for one would certainly agree with this,what do others think?
Regards.
Jim.B.

[Tony Morcom]

Just caught the end of it myself Jim and it was certainly very stirring. Perhaps it is something which should be seriously considered for who ever takes over after the Queen. Obviously at this stage it is unknown who that will be because we don't know how long she intends to carry on. Prince Charles may well decide he's too old when she eventually dies in which case it will be King William(?) and Queen Katherine. In that event I think it would be very fitting to have the change. Just my opinion.

[Keith at Tregenna]

The music to which the words of the refrain "Land of Hope and Glory" are set is the "trio" theme from Edward Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1. The words were fitted to the melody on the suggestion of King Edward VII who told Elgar he thought the melody would make a great song. When Elgar was requested to write a work for the King's coronation, he worked the suggestion into his Coronation Ode, for which he asked the poet and essayist A. C. Benson to write the words. The last section of the Ode uses the march's melody.

Due to the King's illness, the coronation was postponed. Elgar created a separate song, which was first performed by Madame Clara Butt in June 1902. In fact, only the first of the seven stanzas of the Ode's final section was re-used, as the first four lines of the second stanza below. This stanza is the part which is popularly sung today.

Lyrics:

Solo:

Dear Land of Hope, thy hope is crowned,
God make thee mightier yet !
On Sov'ran brows, beloved, renowned,
Once more thy crown is set.
Thine equal laws, by Freedom gained,
Have ruled thee well and long ;
By Freedom gained, by Truth maintained,
Thine Empire shall be strong.

Chorus:

Land of Hope and Glory, Mother of the Free,
How shall we extol thee, who are born of thee?
Wider still and wider shall thy bounds be set;
God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet,
God, who made thee mighty, make thee mightier yet.

Solo:

Thy fame is ancient as the days,
As Ocean large and wide :
A pride that dares, and heeds not praise,
A stern and silent pride ;
Not that false joy that dreams content
With what our sires have won ;
The blood a hero sire hath spent
Still nerves a hero son.

Chorus:

K.

[happy daze john in oz]

There was a time when England was indeed a land of hope and glory. Now I am not so sure, the way things are going there just now. The only ones with the hope are all the sick birds arriving in the country, they hope they csan get as mucg as possible. Then once they have it they glory in the wonder of it all.
But on one thing I agree from what I hear and read the country apears to have lost much of it's single mindedness in overcoming adversity. To et it bcak on track maybe it needs to revive the Dunquirke spirit once again, kick the EU into touch and proclaim that once again it is a GREAT BRITAIN.

[Ivan Cloherty]

With all the single mothers around and the present incumbents in power perhaps the anthem should be.. "Land of Grope and Tory"

[Lou Barron]

If my memory serves me right this was played by a band on the Liverpool landing stage in October 1945 when the SS Monawai disembarked ex pow of the Japanese and the people sang it with gusto