Country star Ronny Milsap’s version of “Smoky Mountain Rain” was selected last week as Tennessee’s state song — a prestigious honor, I thought, until learning that it was the eighth song so designated.
It joins such standards as “My Homeland Tennessee,” “Tennessee Waltz” and “See, See, See, Tennessee Tuxedo.” Ha, ha; we were just kidding about “Tennessee Waltz.”
Not only does Tennessee have more state songs than any other state (and don’t say we don’t provide great bar-bet fodder in this column) it even has an Official Tennessee Bicentennial Rap Song. It starts “TENNE-, TENNE-, TENNES-SEE/Oh, how proud we are of thee!” indicating it was written by Jam Master Lame. Or this: “Presidents, Presidents — proud are we/Jackson, Polk, and Johnson — three!” Most people can count to three on their own. What about: “Presidents come from among our folk/Jackson, Johnson, James K. Polk!” That’s got to be an improvement, and the only other rap I ever wrote was about my unfortunate run-in with the IRS: “Nuthin but uh EZ Form Thang.”
Of course, the Volunteer State (that’s Tennessee’s nickname; it’s also known as the “Big Bend State,” the “Hogs and Hominy” state and the “Scarfs up All the State Songs” state) is far from alone in having unusual official songs. One can only wonder at the maudlin sentimentality suggested by titles like “Home Means Nevada,” “Hail, South Dakota” or “Utah, We Love Thee.”
Most states’ songs are profoundly predictable, among them Alabama’s (“Alabama”), Illinois’ (“Illinois”), Wyoming’s (“Wyoming”) and Alaska’s (“We Can See Russia From Here”).
And from the looks of it, somebody’s been doing a little rewriting, as there are several titles that bear more than passing similarities: “Beautiful Nebraska” and “Beautiful Ohio,” or “Michigan, My Home” and “Washington, My Home.”
You can sing — or, at least, would recognize — more state songs than you might have guessed, including Connecticut’s (“Yankee Doodle”), Georgia’s (“Georgia On My Mind”), Oklahoma’s (“Oklahoma,” from the musical) and Kansas’ (“Home on the Range”).
Then there are states whose songs aren’t what you’d guess. “California, Here I Come” is not California’s state song. Nor is the “The Yellow Rose of Texas” sung at official functions in Texas, “Rocky Mountain High” in Colorado or “Blue Moon of Kentucky” in the Bluegrass State.
Neither “New York State of Mind” nor “New York, New York” are the Empire State’s official song. It's stuck with that “I Love New York” ditty from an old PR campaign, which is practically cheating. Seems like it would be more fun to designate a state song than commission one. As the folks in Tennessee can tell you, commissioned songs end up with phrases like “proud are we!”
