And every two years I cast my vote for France.

Surely the Marseilliese beats the rest (including God Save The Queen) every time.

Rousing, stirring, melodic - the best of the lot.

I love the German one too (and stole it for my 1972 Olympic Game Theme - about to be revived as the Official 2008 Theme available on iTunes),,, but the French surely are the best.

Any other votes?

The Russian national anthem for me every time. A good rousing tune, like a national anthem should be. I believe they dropped it for a while after the end of the Soviet Union, but wisely brought it back. I love the Israeli anthem too, a subtle tone poem by Smetana. Not very anthemic, but different, though you rarely hear it as Israel never qualify for anything.

I predict Glen will be chipping in with his vote for God Save the Queen at any moment. We've had many an argument about that.

It's surprising how often national anthems are in the news. Did you know the Spanish one has no words? Who can sing the infamous sixth verse of "God Save the Queen"? How come Florida's state song is "Swanee"?

www.a-lyric.com/archives/category/anthems/

The British National Anthem should be the Dr Who theme.

We all know the words!

To make it popular we could get the winner of any Pop-Talent-Thing to do the "Woooo-ooooo" or Dame Kiri Te Kanawa for a bit of class.

I see Chris Evans has started a national anthems slot on his R2 show and a little bird tells me he got the idea from this very thread on this very board.

Nice to know we continue to influence the nation's broadcasters.