A Mother’s Rebuttal Recasts Whitney Houston’s 1991 Anthem as Gospel Power, Not Pop Gloss

Whitney Houston’s performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner” at Super Bowl XXV — a moment now regarded as one of the most influential live vocal interpretations of the national anthem — was not universally praised in its own time. Some viewers argued she interpreted the song in a way that sounded too contemporary, claiming the arrangement and delivery made the anthem feel like mainstream pop rather than a solemn ceremonial piece.

Her mother, gospel artist Cissy Houston, rejected that framing outright. In an interview cited in Ebony at the time, Cissy countered that what some critics were calling “pop” was in fact the sound of pure vocal tradition — a church-rooted approach to phrasing, breath, and resonance — applied to a national moment. To her, the audience’s physical response was proof: the stadium shook because the performance connected.

Context is essential. The performance happened less than two weeks after the start of the Gulf War. The anthem was arranged with deliberate rhythmic lift, handled by Rickey Minor and John Clayton Jr., and backed by The Florida Orchestra. That slight rhythmic shift — away from military march rigidity — is what critics pointed to. But it is also the shift that gave the vocal room to ascend, and made the moment so distinctive.

The public embraced it overwhelmingly. Arista Records released the performance as a single. It charted in 1991 — and again after September 11, 2001 — and became the only national anthem recording ever to reach the Top 10 on the Billboard Hot 100. Houston and her management donated the profits to charitable funds supporting military families and, later, emergency workers.

The detail that endures — and the one Cissy Houston emphasized — is that the interpretation was not a shortcut to mass appeal. It was rooted in a lifelong vocal language. The result created a new reference point: a national anthem not only sung correctly, but sung expressively enough to shift the room, shift the conversation, and shift the standard for every singer who came after.