Aretha Franklin: My Country 'Tis Of Thee (Live at Barack Obama's Inauguration) (Video)

Freaking historic.....when Aretha passes, who's going to carry on the torch? Mary J. Blige? Cuz Mary's voice cracking final note at the Neighborhood Ball was ugly.

The Queen Of Soul! This brought tears to my eyes. It was sooooooooooooooooo inspiring. God Bless Aretha! Nice hat.

Are you frikin kidding me?? Her rendition of the song was the particular lack of enounciation of the that was so horrid. Cold has nothing to do with her not being able to pronounce the words correctly. I'm a singer and have sung in very cold weather and know what's it's like, and give her no pass on ripping apart a song such as this.

In pure Aretha style, her over-the-top soulful rendition with all her unecessary vocal gymnastic really didn't do much for the song at all, but rather lessoned the meaning of the tune.

I'll conceed that of course it was a very touching moment in history, blah blah blah, but I really would've loved to hear the song as it was meant to be sung, with the correct pronounciation so we could all understand just wtf she was singing.

My mom's a professional soprano and understands the differences in style, interpretations, and meaning of those elements when singing. I think being a musical "snob" is out of place for this particular performance because it wasn't all about the execution of the music, but the symbolism of who sang the song and the words. Aretha accentuated the word "freedom" in her R&B style as a way to point out those lyrics. She was struggling I think because of not only the cold and her weight, but because of the momentous occasion she found herself in. Being from Detroit she has witnessed some horrific episodes; being from Ann Arbor, I know what those were. I feel that cynicism as in "it was a very touching moment in history blah, blah, blah" is out of place because it REALLY was. Leave it.

Let Freedom Ring! Yeah!