Don’t count the Hockey Night in Canada theme song out yet.
The CBC says despite earlier media reports, talks are still continuing. Some inside the CBC speculate that the news release from the publisher is an attempt to apply negotiating pressure.
But, “in the event we can’t reach an agreement,” a CBC spokesperson told InsideTheCBC.com, “We will proceed with a national contest to create a new theme.”
The Toronto agency representing the composer of the theme tune for Hockey Night in Canada said on its web site that the CBC had declined to enter into a new licensing agreement for the song for next NHL season. (The CBC’s licence agreement for the hockey theme song ended with the Stanley Cup final.)
The familiar theme music for Hockey Night in Canada was written in 1968 by Dolores Claman, who was raised in Vancouver. Each use of the song in the past has cost the broadcaster about $500, the company says. A lawsuit filed against the CBC in late 2004 by Claman alleging that the broadcaster was overusing the Hockey Night in Canada theme has not been settled.
Reaction on the blogs is already starting to tumble in:
Influential Vancouver blogger Rebecca Bollwitt says:
There are copyright issues, legal battles etc. but when it boils down to it, I truly think this tune belongs to all Canadians. When I hear the scratchy, “Hello Canada, and hockey fans in the United States and Newfoundland,” intro I get chills. The tune kicks in and you know you’re setting in for a great night of hockey. There’s a even a Facebook Group dedicated to make the HNIC theme the song for medal ceremonies at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics.
The National Post suggests these replacements:
- We’re Going to Win, Bryan Adams: Yes, Bryan Adams.
- Danielle (She Don’t Care About Hockey), by The Hanson Brothers: The ex-NoMeansNo mix The Ramones and punk. This would be the Strombo of hockey theme songs.
- The Lonely End of the Rink, Tragically Hip: The Hip are to music as hockey is to sport.
- Hit Somebody, Warren Zevon: Perhaps the only American to write a song about hockey. Even though it’s about a Canadian.
- The Ballad of Wendel Clark, Part 1&2, The Rheostatics: It’s easy to see the trajectory of Dave Bidini from hockey-singing rocker to hockey-writing writer.
- Fifty Mission Cap, Tragically HIp: Leafs references? Hockey cards? NHL mythology? This song could only be bested by…
- The Hockey Song, Stompin’ Tom Connors: If you scoff, just watch the video.
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Hip and Stompin’ Tom would get my vote… if ever I were to accept the fact that the HNIC theme would not be played again
No disrespect to the musicians named, but I want the Hockey Night theme, accepting no substitutes. It’s lasted three or four generations to date, and it can last at least as many more.
Stick with the best.
“Wendel was a man with a stick in his hands
he learned how to play in Kelvington S.A.S.K.
You`ll wish that you had died
when Wendel has your hide
`cause he does it the Canadian way.”
That’s a terrific song, but keep the original music. Fight the power.
Looks more like classic hard bargaining than a real news story.
Given how much HNIC announcers make, $500 a show for the theme looks very very cheap.
the proper link for the second song is
http://radio3.cbc.ca/play/band/Hanson-Brothers/Danielle-she-dont-care-about-hockey/
Read between the lines of the news reports–”If the negotiations fail there might be a contest for a new Hockey Night in Canada theme.”
That’s probably what they were planning all along, Drop the Hockey Night theme song, one of the last CBC traditions (one that works). (Stursberg has screwed up all the rest) Create a new reality television show (oops factual entertainment) for the theme contest.
But there was a leak and they got caught with their goalie pads down.
While CBC management likes the money that comes in from Hockey Night in Canada, I’ll bet most of them never watched a game when they were kids, much less as adults.
So much for “respect for the audience.” The reaction to this debacle is even more negative than it was for The One and re-engineering Radio 2 for teenyboppers.
I resent your trying to hype your friends by referring to a blogger as being “influential”.
How do you justify making such a declaration and using the veneer of the CBC to promote an outsiders credibility? And what evidence is there for claiming that the person so named exerts any influence on anyone whatsoever?
Such manipulation is a new low for the motivation behind this blog.
alexa.com has her ahead of insidethecbc, Teamakers (requiescat in stasis), raymitheminx (a personal fave of yours, Allan), saskboy, and now I’m too bored to keep looking.
Aaanyway… this is all just a storm in a teacup – once a certain ED gets a bit of attention it’ll be business as usual.
I think it’s the word “influential” which is ruffling a few feathers.
Nope, Allan just has some Tod-related issues to work out. So it’s just a single feather, attached to an ass.
I love the tune as much as the next guy, and it’s certainly iconic. But the composer’s agent is negotiating in public for a tune that has made her rich for 40 years while she’s simultaneously suing the people she’s trying to cut a deal with? Fishy. And does anyone know the proposed terms of the new deal? I believe $500 a pop was the old deal. Is it worth *any* amount of your tax dollars? We got over The Maple Leaf Forever, we can survive this national crisis.
Why not have a contest to chose a new national anthem while we are at it?
The sheer stupidity of the CBC’s actions in this affair boggle the mind.
So much damage has been done to the CBC’s reputation and standing in the last 24 hours. So unnecessary, and so disheartening for fans of public broadcasting.
Someone at CBC needs to fix this, and fast. A contest for a new theme song will go over about as well as “The One”.
To take a page from the Radio 2 playbook–perhaps there’s a perception among CBC brass that the HNIC theme is too elitist. Maybe it’s time that the CBC opened up the show’s theme song to a much wider variety of music that truly reflects the tapestry of Canadian culture.
I can’t say exactly why this means so much to me but it may have something to do with the fact that hockey was life in the winter for me and many others growing up at one time and my first real sense of it’s exciting nature came from watching it on CBC, saturday nights. When I hear the music it rekindles in me the sense of excitement that tonights game may bring. The hammering of bodies, the fakes one way then the other, the shot from the point that hits the top corner in behind the goalie. I even have images of walking to the arena in the cold of winter with this song trumpeting my arrival to the arena, in the back of my head. These are all images that spring from this great anthem, that is accentuated by the trumpets.
It would be a great shame, and I emphasize the word shame here, to think that someones agenda, that has little to do with the tradition so many have enjoyed for decades now, is more important than keeping this tradition alive. I’m not sure who is to blame for it all but surely there must be some sort of compromise available.
I heard it said on the radio today that eventually the uproar over such a change would settle. I agree, however the image of CBC, that has made me proud to be Canadian for a good long time, would forever be lost on the sense that it is now just a conglomerate with no greater concern than it’s bottom line.
Where will the pride come from then?
Warren Zevon isn’t the only American to write a hockey song, Check out The Zambonis, they only sing songs about hockey and they aren’t half bad, either. I’m sure there are a few of their songs that could be substitutes…
Come on CBC do you not understand tradition at all? Do you not understand branding?
Those opening titles with Foster Hewitt’s voice and THE theme ARE Canada. For goodness sake pay the lady her money and keep the tradtion alive.
Would anyone even know of it if it hadn’t been the HNIC theme fot the past few decades? I say give Stompin’ Tom a try!
I dunno. They’ve changed the damned song so much trying to “update it with the times” that this one sounds nothing like the one I grew up with. It’s practically disappeared anyway. I can’t get very excited about any of this. And, hell, I used to stay watching the closing credits scroll by just to hear the intermezzo that only played at the close. So if even I can’t get excited about it, then who cares.
For anyone who caught Rob Moore on TV last night, he stated that the CBC has been in talks with Nett werk for over a year now about this “Contest”. I think it’s dirty and low – the CBC has had this coming for a while now. And how convenient this news didn’t drop until after the last puck drop of the season.
The Hockey Night in Canada Theme song is irreplaceable, no others will ever compare and I don’t even know how the CBC could even conceive the idea of axing it. The CBC pulls in enough revenue from HNIC to afford the licensing cost. And again, the CBC is paid though Tax Payer Funding – if Canadians overwhelmingly want the Theme to stay, it shoud stay!
I have such fond memories of gathering in front of the TV with my Dad and 4 older brothers, the song got us all pumped up for the action ahead! My Dad passed on to that Big Hockey Rink in the Sky in 2006…. I can’t even imagine what he would think of the HNIC Anthem no longer greeting us at the beginning of Saturday Night games…
Save the Song!!!
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=15856240115
Don’t hockey fans pay their bills? I can’t believe the outrage. It is taxpayer money that they spend and I don’t like them wasting it or throwing it away. CBC has already had to forgo the olympics after 2008, it’s called compromise. It’s time to give another artist a chance to play the game. And anyone who says it will make an ounce of difference and that they won’t watch isn’t a hockey fan.
The theme song is dead, long live the new theme song.
Whatever.
In the meantime, it seems as though both sides trying to play hardball with each other has blown up in all of our faces if the latest at cbcnews.ca is to be believed…
I would give up Mansbridge’s big salary to keep the theme. Bring in a cheaper talking head and keep the music!
from the Toronto Star: June 6, 2008 …
CBC ices Hockey Night theme
“CBC wasted little time getting over the disappointment of Friday’s events, announcing a contest which invites musicians from across Canada to compose the new “Hockey Night” theme song. The winning composer will earn $100,000 for the ditty, with a portion of future royalties going towards minor hockey associations throughout the country.”
Two options would seem to exist:
a) we, the citizens and supporters of the HNIC theme raise the money to buy Dolores out (and we certainly could – a few dollars each would be all that it would take).
b) We speak to the CBC in a manner which it can truly understand – we tune it OUT for as long as it takes to get this corrected. No CBC TV viewing, no CBC Radio. Sorry to the many staff there we have respect for, but your management have given us no choice.
Must have been “too classical” and “elitist” for the CBC genius gerbils.
It just makes me weary.
I may have to look in to wearing my metal mixing bowl in the hopes of avoiding whatever waves scrambled the alleged brains of the CBC management team.
Radio 2, now this.
radio 2, jpod, HNIC. you may as well give up on hockey if they take the theme away. tho this one could be cool, and is the intermezzo that @althus mentioned…
http://www.televisiontunes.com/Hockey_Night_In_Canada_(1950s_-_Big_Band).html
Hey Rob – threats to TUNE OUT the CBC fall in deaf ears. The country already tunes the CBC out for everything but HNIC and Corrie. They don’t need to care because they have the gravy train of $1Billion a year of taxpayers’ money no matter what left wing tripe they broadcast.
OK,
Over the past few years I’ve heard about money troubles at the CBC. The is NO WAY they can be this broke, however this would be a great way for them to shove a giant dagger through thier own hearts. HNIC is the only most watched Canadian made television program. Why in the world would they want to take the only recognizable flag off that show? If they go ahead and do it anyway, AFTER the public outcry, they may as well sell out to the Americans as well and call it NBC’s Hockey Night in America. Also, if your not going to give us a say in anything, then STOP spending OUR money!
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