Aren’t most brags truth though? I mean, if you are lying I wouldn’t call that bragging… I would call it… lying. I only consider it bragging if it’s factual, or at least subjectively accurate.
If this is the kind of analysis you apply to songs from musicals, I’d rather not have you sitting near me
This is more of an after the show, when I’ve thought about the stuff for a while, and probably mostly on the internet sort of thing.
In musicals this sort of thing is usually acceptible. Wicked does it a LOT, and I love it.
Actually, in Wicked it isn’t so much “had to find a rhyme” as it is “have a rhyme, now I need to fit it in”.
to begin with, the song originally was “She’s a Grand Old Rag”, and gonna say there aren’t very many “nice” words that rhyme with flag.
https://www.rhymezone.com/r/rhyme.cgi?Word=flag&typeofrhyme=perfect&loc=sitelinks
I mean, I suppose they could’ve done something like
“where we’ve got plenty things about which to brag”… but then it doesn’t scan
Or they could have avoided the word “brag” altogether. Although most of those rhymes are really terrible, so just rewrite the entire stanza…
I don’t know why the line is there. But is is very much not a true statement when talking about Americans. Which was my original point.
Well, get back to me when you write a song people are still singing over 100 years later.
D likes it when I sing the Cohan songs. When I take him on the rails-to-trails I usually sing songs with a good striding rhythm. Another fave is Alphabet of Nations:
it’s got a good beat, and you can walk to it
Oh, I can (and have) complained about songs much older than that… 
The Grand Old Flag song is fine, good even - except for that line that is a filthy lie…
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Not a realization about a song, but maybe a missed realization…
In the picture montage video for my brother in law’s funeral the song “imagine” was used. It struck me as odd to use a song for the funeral of a religious person, and a very religious family, that has the first line “Imagine there’s no Heaven”.
It wasn’t Lenin’s recording - it was some a cappella version, so it may have had altered lyrics - it wasn’t loud enough for me to pick them out.
People are so weird about wedding and funeral music. I’ve been to a wedding where the first dance song was “Every Breath You Take” which is not remotely about love, but about a stalker. Also been to two where the first dance song was “I Will Always Love You” which has an appropriate-seeming title, until you realize that it’s actually a break-up song.
And don’t even get me started on church rules about what is and isn’t allowed for weddings and funerals.
Are those rules written down somewhere? Asking for a thread.
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There definitely are written down rules in many churches… but many are smart enough not to put them on the internet.
When I got married, the organist had a list of acceptable pieces for different parts of the ceremony (and played snippets for us.) We also had a “pick one from A, one from B” etc. for the Bible readings. That was a short list.
Catholic funeral Masses may have a bit more leeway (they played “When Irish Eyes are Smiling” for the recessional for my Aunt Pat’s funeral… but the recessional is after Mass is over, as processional is before the Mass starts. So the rules there are looser. Songs during Mass are more restrictive.)
A little OT but not sure when I could get this tidbit in else where.
On Sunday the 5th of July, we sang patriotic hymns during the service. (And LDS service) Often they will use the Star Spangled Banner as one of the hymns during the service as it is in the hymnal. This year they didn’t but the first hymn played in the postlude as people are milling about leaving the chapel heading to Sunday School class and such was … you got it, the Star Spangled Banner. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do. There is no flag in the chapel so I didn’t feel the need to put my hand over my heart, though upon further research maybe I should have.
The music was played at a fairly low volume and I’m pretty sure the vast majority of people there didn’t hear or listen enough to even know what was being played. Then to top it off, the organist played 3 or 4 verses. I finally left about halfway through the 3rd verse as the majority of those in attendance had left the chapel and the remaining were oblivious to the situation and I started feeling self-conscious standing there with no one else around me.
We had a heckuva time getting the church to agree to playing “Eternal Father Strong To Save” at my stepdad’s funeral. It wasn’t on their pre-approved list of funeral songs (despite being in their hymnal, which we repeatedly pointed out) so they declared it “inappropriate for a Roman Catholic funeral mass”.
It was at that exact moment that I slightly lost my shit and screamed “it was played at John F Kennedy’s funeral mass and if it’s good enough for JFK then it’s good enough for my step-father!!!” They didn’t have a response for that, and thus relented.
Technically you are supposed to face the flag if there is one, or face towards where the music is coming from if there isn’t. And I believe hand over heart in either case.
My (Presbyterian) church did a lot of patriotic songs on the 4th, but all with a religious aspect to them. America the Beautiful, Battle Hymn of the Republic, God Bless America, God of our Fathers…
Growing up in a United Methodist church we sang the 4th verse of My Country, Tis of Thee every Sunday after the doxology. I still instinctively sing that verse rather than the first any time I hear it because I’m now far more familiar with the 4th verse than the 1st! (Our fathers God to Thee, author of liberty, to Thee we sing. Long may our land be bright with freedom’s holy light, protect us by Thy might, great God our king!)
I sometimes do music in a different UMC church that didn’t do this, so I don’t know if the denomination changed, or if that was unique to the church I grew up in. 
I would, but that’s neither here nor there.
With respect to our wedding, the main aspect of the restriction of songs was that the organist would be doing three weddings in a row and wanted to pull only from their repertoire. We could have hired our own organist, and gotten other songs approved, I’m sure. When my mom got remarried, one of her friends who was an operatic singer did one of the songs during the wedding Mass from his own repertoire. But the Purcell Trumpet Voluntary for the processional, for example, adapted for organ was just fine. It needn’t be fancy. We’d be doing the Electric Slide just a few hours later as it was.
In the Catholic Church, the Mass doesn’t start until the priest does the sign of the cross, and it doesn’t end til the priest says “The Mass has ended”. We would sing the “odd” songs from the hymnal for recessional, as it was definitely after Mass – that’s when any patriotic songs like God Bless America would be sung. I don’t think I’ve ever heard the anthem after Mass (America the Beautiful, My Country Tis of Thee, Battle Hymn of the Republic, etc – all of these, yes), because it generally sounds awful with a group of non-professionals given the range in the song. My parish defaults to God Bless America.
Also, we’ll sing “Hail Holy Queen” at the drop of a hat, but that’s a different issue.
Freudian slip?
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Plus it’s not really a romantic song. Dolly Parton wrote it to Porter Wagoner when she left his variety show.
I don’t think so.
(emphasis added)