marvin gaye sings "the star-spangled banner"

Marvin Gaye Sings "The Star-Spangled Banner"Author(s): Jeff FallisSource: The Iowa Review, Vol. 34, No. 3 (Winter, 2004/2005), pp. 81-82Published by: University of IowaStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20151895 .

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JEFF FALL?S

Marvin Gaye Sings "The Star-Spangled Banner"

(N.B.A. All-Star Game, Los Angeles, February 13, 1983)

Aviator shades

shading dark eyes, suit conservative,

he strides up to center

court and touches the mike

with the half-funky drum beat already

booming forth from

the P.A. Before

he's hit a note,

there's already risk

in the air, this sense

of exploratory grace that only deepens when

he sings the first few bars

way down low,

soft, slow, and soulful.

Somehow the song, hard to sing in the first

place, seems a new

thing, a new body with new blood, full of air and open

space, wounded and healed.

You don't know

where he's going with it,

and what's exciting is that

it sounds like he doesn't

know either. The ramparts, the broad stripes, the bright stars, the twilight's last gleaming, the bombs

bursting in air, all

81

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alive and open to oxygen

again. The crowd gets more into it

as he goes along; they whoop and holler when he nails

the high notes, and by the end he's won over

the entire Forum, Doctor

J included. It's

a gorgeous moment, and Marvin,

coke-sick and exhausted,

basks in the warm applause,

gives 'em a grin, won't

take off his shades.

82

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