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Sports & Games
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The Time Las Vegas Sang 'O Canada' to the Tune of 'O Christmas Tree'
In 1994, the CFL's Las Vegas Posse held their first home game. Tasked with singing the Canadian national anthem, a performer who didn't know the melody improvised by singing the words to 'O Canada' to the tune of 'O Christmas Tree,' creating a legendary sports blunder.
In the wild, often surreal annals of sports history, few moments perfectly capture the spirit of a doomed venture quite like the time the Canadian national anthem was performed as a Christmas carol. This wasn't a holiday-themed game; it was the inaugural home opener for the Las Vegas Posse, a short-lived team in the Canadian Football League's ill-fated American expansion of the mid-1990s. What unfolded was a moment of such baffling absurdity that it has become legendary.
A Gamble in the Desert
The year was 1994. The CFL, looking to expand its reach and revenue, embarked on an ambitious experiment: planting teams in the United States. Among them were the Sacramento Gold Miners, the Shreveport Pirates, and the Las Vegas Posse. The idea was fraught with challenges from the start. American audiences were largely unfamiliar with the rules of Canadian football—the larger field, three downs, and the 'rouge'. In Las Vegas, this cultural disconnect was amplified by the scorching desert heat and a general apathy from a community saturated with other entertainment options.
The Anthem Anomaly
On July 8, 1994, the Posse hosted their first-ever home game at Sam Boyd Stadium against the Sacramento Gold Miners. Before the game could even begin, history was made. A local lounge singer and Elvis impersonator named Dennis K.C. Parks was hired to perform the national anthems. He delivered a fine rendition of 'The Star-Spangled Banner,' but when it came time for 'O Canada,' things went sideways. Parks began singing the correct lyrics, but the melody was completely wrong. Instead, he sang the words to the unmistakable tune of 'O Christmas Tree' ('O Tannenbaum'). The television commentators were left momentarily speechless before one managed to stammer out his confusion.
He's singing the words to O Canada, but to the tune of O Tannenbaum... or O Christmas Tree. I don't believe it. I've never heard that before.
On the field, Canadian players looked around in a state of bewildered disbelief. The performance was not a malicious joke but a genuine mistake. According to reports that surfaced later, Parks had been given the lyrics to the anthem but not the sheet music or a recording of the melody. Panicked, he found a tune he knew that fit the meter of the words: 'O Christmas Tree.' The result was an awkward, cringeworthy, and utterly unforgettable performance.
A Symbol of a Failed Experiment
The 'O Christmas Tree' anthem became the perfect metaphor for the Las Vegas Posse and the CFL's entire US expansion. It was a well-intentioned effort marred by a fundamental lack of preparation and cultural understanding. The Posse would go on to last only that single 1994 season, plagued by low attendance, financial woes, and on-field struggles. The entire American expansion folded just a year later, with only the Baltimore Stallions achieving any measure of success. Today, the incident lives on through grainy YouTube clips and sports blooper reels, a hilarious cautionary tale about what can go wrong when you try to force a fit. It stands as a perfect, bizarre snapshot of one of the strangest chapters in professional football history.