Song Seen As A Sound Pick

By GRETCHEN PARKER The Tampa Tribune

Published: Apr 20, 2007

TEMPLE TERRACE - It's black and white, old Florida versus older Florida. Except that it's not that simple.

Gloria Castetter, 47, is old Florida. She was born and raised in Tampa, got her earliest schooling at Stephen Foster Elementary School in the 1960s and remembers learning the song that made composer Stephen Foster famous here - "Old Folks at Home" or, as most people know it, "Swanee River." It's Florida's official state tune.

That old song was on her mind Thursday night as she took in the spring concert of Temple Terrace Elementary School, where her 9-year-old daughter, Kayla, sang with her classmates. Kayla and her friends beamed out at an audience of about 200 in the cafeteria, as they sang an entirely new old song.

Their music teacher, Stephen Ulrey, calls it the "Orange Blossom Song." It's an old ditty about sunshine and songbirds, passed down by schoolteachers since the 1950s, that Ulrey has souped up and is lobbying to become Florida's new state song.

Parents who remembered the melody, including Castetter, tapped their feet and soaked it up again.

To Castetter, both songs represent old Florida. At the same time, the song about orange blossoms represents what was best about old Florida.

"Swanee River" was penned by Foster, a Pennsylvanian, in 1851 for performance by minstrel troupes. Florida adopted it as the official state song in 1935.

When quizzed, Castetter couldn't remember the lyrics to it, that it refers to "darkeys" and is an ode to plantation life. She does think the song has "died out" - she hasn't heard it in a while, she said. Even the new governor, Charlie Crist, didn't want it played at his inauguration this year.

"It's just a change in the times," she said.

A tug of war over the sunny "Orange Blossom Song" may become more contentious though. Billye-Mullins Smith, a pianist in Winter Haven, holds the copyright on the tune and doesn't consent to Ulrey's promotion of it.

Soon, Ulrey plans to line up his version of the "Orange Blossom Song" alongside dozens of others for the chance to be the new state song. The nonprofit Florida Music Educators' Association is organizing a search for a new Florida anthem; with the help of Internet voters, the winning song would be written into a bill for consideration by state lawmakers next year.

The group plans to begin accepting submissions through a Web site, www.justsingflorida.com, by May 15.

Reporter Gretchen Parker can be reached at (813) 259-7562 or gparker@tampatrib.com.