Students from schools across South Carolina perform "While I Breathe, I Hope" during a 2021 virtual choir performance created by Craig Allen and the South Carolina American Choral Directors Association. (Photo courtesy of Craig Allen, a Winthrop University adjunct instructor of music)
COLUMBIA — South Carolina’s new choral anthem puts the state’s nearly 250-year-old motto to music with a uniting message of hope.
The designation, following a decade of persistence by its creator and a York County legislator, comes in time for performances celebrating the nation’s founding and the outsized role South Carolina played.
But the anthem, titled “While I Breathe, I Hope,” is meant to be timeless, said its composer, James Kevin Gray. He hopes South Carolinians sing it together for generations to come.
“At a time when so much can divide us, ‘While I Breathe, I Hope’ reminds us that we share a common future, a common home, and a common responsibility to one another,” he told the SC Daily Gazette.
The title is the translation of “Dum Spiro Spero,” the Latin words adopted as a state motto in South Carolina’s seal, authorized by the state’s first General Assembly in April 1776. Designed after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, the seal was first used in May 1777 by the state’s first non-colonial governor.
“Those words speak to something timeless and universal: Hope belongs to all of us,” said Gray, who communicated via email from France, where he moved in April to be the director of music ministries at the American Church in Paris.
“I wanted to create a work that honors South Carolina’s rich history while looking confidently toward its future.”
The anthem was among three official state designations passed by the Legislature this year. The prothonotary warbler became the state migratory bird in February, a distinction from the Carolina wren, which has been the state bird since 1948.
“Carolina When I Die” was signed into law as an official state song on May 18. The 2024 release of that song, written by Camden native Patrick Davis, features two other South Carolina singer-songwriters: Darius Rucker and Edwin McCain. It’s actually the third official state song, following designations of “Carolina” in 1911 and “South Carolina on My Mind” in 1984.
“While I Breathe, I Hope,” which was signed into law May 15, is the only official anthem. Like “The Star-Spangled Banner,” the national anthem, it’s intended to be an uplifting unifier, Gray said.
“I specifically wanted this to be a choral work because choral music is fundamentally a community activity,” Gray said. “Whether it is sung by a middle school choir, a high school ensemble, a church choir, or a collegiate chorus, the goal has always been for people to experience the joy of making music together.”
He composed the anthem 13 years ago, when he was minister of music at River Hills Community Church near Lake Wylie.
He was inspired as he drove through York County, thinking of “the natural beauty around me” and the “many beautiful places that make South Carolina unique,” from the Lowcountry to the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Oconee County, where the ninth-generation South Carolinian grew up.
The roughly 2-minute song has been performed multiple times since, including in 2016 by the choir of his alma mater, Winthrop University, where he earned a bachelor’s in music education 17 years earlier.
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic in 2021, the South Carolina chapter of the American Choral Directors Association chose “While I Breathe, I Hope” for a virtual choir made up of students from across the state.
The effort to make the song an official state anthem started in 2015, when Gray met Rep. John King at a town hall-style event at Freedom Temple Ministries in Rock Hill, where the Rev. Jesse Jackson took questions from attendees.
At their next meeting in Columbia in 2016, Gray played a recording of the song performed by the Clover High School Choraliers, which prompted King to introduce the first bill to make it an anthem.
At the time, the song’s title had plural pronouns: “While We Breathe, We Hope.”
Gray thought “we” aligned better with the song’s intended message. But that’s not a direct translation of the state’s motto.
For the second bill, pre-filed ahead of the 2017 session, the “we” was changed to “I.” But the legislation still got no traction.
The fourth bill, introduced ahead of the 2021 session, specified the song as a choral anthem and newly included the words in the legislation. Gray called those changes a turning point. Still, the bill went nowhere.
Gray said he sometimes doubted the bill would ever pass. But King reassured him to never give up.
“The state motto, ‘While I Breathe, I Hope,’ is truly something James lives by…I was honored to be a part of this process,” said King, D-Rock Hill.
It took an unexpected bipartisan collaboration for the idea to advance.
In early 2025, Gray reached out to freshman Rep. Adam Duncan, R-Seneca, whom he’d known since middle school, and connected him with King.
Days after King filed the sixth proposal to make the song an anthem, Duncan signed on as a co-sponsor. Two months later, the House approved the legislation unanimously. Also signing on as a co-sponsor was Rep. Kambrell Garvin, D-Columbia, a 2013 Winthrop graduate.
“I thought it was a very patriotic song that seemed to hit a heart note in every South Carolinian,” Duncan told the SC Daily Gazette about co-sponsoring the bill, adding that he always thought highly of Gray.
“He was very talented and very passionate about what he did, and I thought it came through in the piece,” he said.
The Senate unanimously passed the bill April 30 and sent it to McMaster’s desk.
“South Carolina is a state with a rich history and people who care deeply about where they come from,” McMaster said about signing the bill. “The official choral anthem reflects the pride we share in our state from the Lowcountry to the Upstate. This designation is a fitting tribute to South Carolina and the values that continue to guide us.”
From the blue of coastal waters to the green of mountainsides.
We stand as sons and daughters of those who bled and died to defend our common interest so we might live and breathe.
We take this freedom given and build upon their dreams.
Dum spiro spero, while I breathe, I hope.
Hope enough for all who dwell here under Carolina skies.
Hope for tomorrow that begins with us today and will last for generations for all who chose to stay.
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Courtesy of South Carolina Daily Gazette
