The St. Louis Cardinals beat the Texas Rangers at Game 1 of the World Series Wednesday night in St. Louis. For those who follow baseball the game was exciting and a close scoring game.
For those who follow musicians, there is usually a great interest in the singer that is chosen to sing the National Anthem before the game. This year Scotty McCreery, the 2011 American Idol was chosen for this honor. The young country singer had a scare as he began the Anthem…his mic was not working. Fortunately, he was able to start over and sang a country rendition of the Star Spangled Banner.
Scotty is the second American Idol to sing the National Anthem at Game 1 of a World Series. In 2003, Clay Aiken performed the anthem. For Clay, the 2003 World Series must hold a special place in his memory. The New York Yankees were hosting the Florida Marlins at Yankee Stadium. Clay sang a great rendition of the difficult anthem, even when being interrupted by the low flying Stealth Bombers. I wonder if Clay still has his World Series Jacket from that night.
The following are a few interesting facts about The World Series.
- The first World Series of baseball took place in 1903 between the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Boston Americans.
- Don Larsen of the New York Yankees pitched the first and only perfect game in World Series history in 1956.
- The first World Series shown on TV was the 1947 World Series between the Yankees and the Dodgers.
- The 1989 World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Oakland A’s was postponed for 10 days after a massive earthquake rocked Northern California.
- The 1994 World Series was cancelled after baseball players went on strike in August of 1994.
I have always thought it was a huge honor to be invited to sing at the opening game of a World Series. It made me wonder who has done this in the years since Clay sang in 2003.
- 2004 Steven Tyler – the lead singer of Aerosmith
- 2005 Josh Grobin
- 2006 Bob Seeger – refused to sing the Star Spangled Banner because he said it was too hard to sing. He chose to sing America the Beautiful.
- 2007 John Williams and the Boston Pops Orchestra
- 2008 Backstreet Boys
- 2009 Keni Thomas (a U.S. Army Ranger)
- 2010 John Legend
Did you watch Clay sing the Star Spangled Banner that night? Did you hold your breath the entire time like I did? What an exciting time for Clay, his family, friends and fans!!
Why not watch the performance again. This time you can breathe!!