The Fourth of July is a day of summer weather, barbeques and national hot dog eating competitions in America as the nation celebrates its independence.

But few people will know that the tune of the US national anthem, “The Star Spangled Banner”, a song sung proudly at every Super Bowl, actually originally came from England.

The melody to which Francis Scott Key set the lyrics was derived from “To Anacreon in Heaven”, the constitutional song of the Anacreontic Society, a private gentleman’s club in London.

The national anthem of the United States is full of surprises, writes Mark Clague, a professor of musicology at the University of Michigan, in “O Say Can You Hear?: A Cultural Biography of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner.’”

Nearly everything about the 208-year-old anthem – from its meaning to how people sing it – has changed over time. Like America itself, the song is always evolving, Professor Clague tells the Monitor. The interview has been lightly edited and condensed. 

You point out that the first line is a question, not a declaration. Can you explain?

I’m a singer living in Nashville, Tennessee — Music City, USA. But at age 64, you won’t find me singing at the honky-tonks. You’re much more likely to hear me singing in my church choir or perhaps a ballpark.

That’s because I’ve sung the national anthem in public for 20 years. I even accomplished one of my lifelong dreams: to sing for my beloved Chicago Cubs and nearly 40,000 fans at a packed Wrigley Field.

That single performance turned into multiyear, cross-country quest to sing the anthem at all the ballparks in the Chicago Cubs organization, which I completed in 2018.