Not in Kansas anymore

[brightlywoven]

You know you're in England when (number 452)
- You're at a party in early September, and suddenly everybody stands up and sings during Pomp and Circumstance (though they don't know the words)
- This is followed shortly after by everybody standing up and singing Jerusalem (and they do know the words - and some actions)
- Late comers arriving at this point ask 'why we're singing Jerusalem so early?' (not knowing that it's last night of the proms, but thinking that singing Jerusalem is perfectly normal behaviour later on in any party).

To be fair, the whole thing was more rousing than the Australian equivalent (singing Cold Chisel's 'Khe Shan' "Well the last plane out of Sydney's almost gone/ In under seven flying hours and I'll be landing in Hong Kong/ And there ain't nothing like the kisses/ Of a jaded chinese princess...")

Comments

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

and some actions

???

[dr-biscuit.livejournal.com]

You know, with arrows and things...

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Mmm, I can see how it would work, I just hadn't come across it before!

[dr-biscuit.livejournal.com]

Does the fact they were inebriated thespian types help explain the aberration?

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Mm, probably.

[cealdis.livejournal.com]

The one part of the Last Night I really hate occurs just prior and just after Jerusalem, and whilst I like Jerusalem a lot (and view it as the sensible national anthem of this country), the insistence on playing Rule Britannia and God Save the Queen rather spoils it.
When I am in charge, these two pieces of music will be banned as being too appalling and unmusical for words. Otherwise, what did you think of the rest of the music (if you heard the rest of it)?

[dr-biscuit.livejournal.com]

Rule Britannia does seem unnecessarily imperial. God save the Queen is more dirge like (as is the Australian anthem). Interesting to suggest Blake's song as an anthem though, since it does suggest a certain theocracy.

Truth be told, I didn't hear much else of the Last Night - there being much mirth and merriment going on. (Noted later in the evening: Osymandias taking note of the antics of his future maths lecturer as she sang 'Where's me Jumper' (A classic song I had not hitertofore heard))

[cealdis.livejournal.com]

You've never heard "Where's me Jumper"!? But that's a classic!

One of my geology lecturers made us listen to it time and again when we were in France on a field trip over Easter (it would be the last track played at loud volume as we sped towards our hotel after a tiring day in the field), and by the end of the ten days we all knew it like the back of our hands.