'Nazi anthem' played at canoe championship

[Blue_Tires]

The Germany canoeing team were left 'appalled' after organisers at the Canoe Sprint World Championships in Hungary played the banned 'Nazi anthem' at a medal ceremony.
Anne Knorr and Debora Nich won gold for Germany in the 1000 meters K2 women's final race but after receiving their medals they were shocked to hear the Germany anthem played with the verse "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles / Über alles in der Welt," ("Germany, Germany above all / Above everything in the world,")

The music for the German national anthem was composed in 1797 by Joseph Haydn with lyrics written by Hoffmann von Fallersleben in 1841.

The verse beginning "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles" is the first stanza of the piece but was banned in 1952 as those were the lyrics adopted by the Nazis when singing the anthem.

Since then it is the third stanza that has been used which begins "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit / Für das deutsche Vaterland!" (Unity and justice and freedom / For the German fatherland!)

"I ​​am appalled. We cannot accept it," German national coach Rainer Kiessler said in a television interview.

Kiessler added that Hungarian organisers refused to let him verify the anthem before playing it due to a "technical problem."

http://au.eurosport.com/olympicgames/london-2012/2012/germans-appalled-by-gaffe_sto2916606/story.shtml

That can't be an accident, can it?

[Rhythm]

1. The alma mater song at my high school used that same tune...

I didn't realize the significance of it until watching old newsreel footage in US history class...

[Iggo]

4. Mine, too.

I'd play it in the marching band on Friday nights at football games, then I'd hear it on "The World At War" documentaries on Saturday afternoons. (A little added ironic coincidence: My school was quite the blond-headed school.)

[Lionel Mandrake]

6. The World at War included lots of Nazi songs

as well as songs of the other major combatants. For example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYE7iBmjEMg

It's hard to see Rommel as a bad guy, but I have my doubts about those who are nostalgic about the Afrikakorps (see comments in link).

[Lionel Mandrake]

2. Here is the original music by Haydn.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4t3Vmo_EM8Y

Tom Lehrer quotes Haydn on the piano (not in his singing) in his brilliant satire "Wernher von Braun":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QEJ9HrZq7Ro

from which I lifted part of my sig line.

But be sure always to call it please an allusion, not plagiarism.

Tom Lehrer also wrote a song about plagiarism, but I digress from my earlier digression.

To get back on topic, here is an excerpt from Wikipedia:

"The Deutschlandlied ('Song of Germany') ... has been used wholly or partially as the national anthem of Germany since 1922. The music was written by Joseph Haydn in 1797 as an anthem for the birthday of the Austrian Emperor Francis II of the Holy Roman Empire. In 1841, the German linguist and poet August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben wrote the lyrics of "Das Lied der Deutschen" to Haydn's melody, lyrics that were considered revolutionary at the time.

"The song is as well-known by the opening words and refrain of the first stanza, 'Deutschland, Deutschland über alles' (literally, 'Germany, Germany above all'), but this has never been its title. The line 'Germany, Germany above all' meant that the most important goal of the Vormärz revolutionaries should be a unified Germany overcoming the perceived anti-liberal Kleinstaaterei. Alongside the Flag of Germany it was one of the symbols of the March Revolution of 1848.

"In order to endorse its republican and liberal tradition, the song was chosen for national anthem of Germany in 1922, during the Weimar Republic. West Germany adopted the Deutschlandlied as its official national anthem in 1952 for similar reasons, with only the third stanza sung on official occasions. Upon German reunification in 1990, only the third stanza was confirmed as the national anthem."

Read more (including the lyrics): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutschland_Über_Alles

[hifiguy]

3. It really isn't Papa Haydn's fault

that the Chaplin-moustachioed corporal swiped his tune for his own ends.

[Lionel Mandrake]

5. Right you are.

A composer must satisfy two requirements to be smeared as a proto-Nazi:

1. The composer was anti-Semitic, and

2. Hitler liked his music.

The paradigmatic example is Wagner.

[GusBob]

7. shoulda played the music from "deliverance"

paddle faster i hear banjos