Childhood friends from Casselton create new ND anthem

BISMARCK — North Dakota has a new state anthem, thanks to Kyle Gagner and Josh Silbernagel, two childhood friends and longtime songwriters who grew up together in Casselton.

Gagner and Silbernagel played in a band together when they were classmates in the early 2000s, and they stayed in touch over the years.

Gagner said he was working on a song a few years ago when he reached out to Silbernagel, who provided input on the song, including lyrics.

Friends in Nashville produced a recording of the song, dubbed “North Dakota Anthem,” and Gagner said he and Silbernagel decided they would share it with North Dakota tourism officials to see if they might have a use for it.

Turns out they did, and the state tourism office produced a video of the song, which is now used for promotional purposes over social media. It is also

featured on the North Dakota Department of Commerce website

.

Gagner said the team at the state tourism office “did a marvelous job of capturing the essence of what we wrote in song and lyric with video and it brought it all together.”

When state officials asked if they wanted any kind of payment for the song, Gagner said no, as they had decided they were only interested in sharing their art as a way to honor the state they call home.

“I’ve lived here my whole life. I love this place,” Gagner said, adding that what started out as a germ of an idea grew into something he couldn’t have predicted.

“It turned out 100 times better than I expected,” he said.

Though it has not been officially adopted as North Dakota’s state song, Gagner and Silbernagel’s creation may have usurped by virtue of popular awareness the long-recognized “North Dakota Hymn,” which

was dedicated as the official state song in 1947

.

Alicia Jolliffe, social media strategist with the tourism and marketing division of the North Dakota Department of Commerce, said it’s not uncommon for them to get videos and music from people who think what they had to offer would be a great thing to promote the state.

“But when we got Kyle and Josh’s song, it resonated with our whole team to really be something special,” Jolliffe said, adding that they matched the song with existing video footage that had been shot around the state and the project just naturally came about.

Jolliffe described Gagner and Silbernagel as two very proud North Dakotans “who decided they wanted to make something cool one day and they shared it with us.

“And we’re, like, we want to make something cool with it, too. That’s really just what the partnership has been,” Jolliffe added.

Silbernagel said he didn’t have any big expectations when he wrote the song with Gagner, it was “just two friends doing their own thing.”

But since the music has found a broader audience, Silbernagel said he hopes people who hear it come away with a good vibe about the state of North Dakota.

“Good feelings. Goodwill. That would be the big thing,” he said.