The combination of Key's poem and Smith's composition became known as "The Star-Spangled Banner", which was adopted as the national anthem of the United States of America in 1931.

In existence from approximately 1766 to 1792, the Society was dedicated to the ancient Greek poet Anacreon, who was renowned for his drinking songs and odes to love.

Its members, who consisted mainly of wealthy men of high social rank, would meet on Wednesday evenings to combine musical appreciation with eating and drinking.

[1] Each meeting began at half past seven (i.e., 19:30) with a lengthy concert, featuring "the best performers in London", who would be made honorary members of the Society.

Because "some of the comic songs [were not] exactly calculated for the entertainment of ladies, the singers were restrained; which displeasing many of the members, they resigned one after another; and a general meeting being called, the society was dissolved".

[2] It is not clear exactly when this incident occurred, but in October 1792 it was reported that: "The Anacreontic Society meets no more; it has long been struggling with symptoms of internal decay.

The President, then took his seat in the center of the elevated table, at the upper end of the room, supported on each side, by the various Vocal performers.

[5] Parke, writing in the early nineteenth century, recalls: After the concert an elegant supper was served up; and when the cloth was removed, the constitutional song, beginning, 'To Anacreon in Heaven,' was sung by the chairman or his deputy.

The identity of the composer was a subject of controversy until the discovery, in the mid-twentieth century, of a passage in a then-unpublished manuscript of Recollections written by Richard John Samuel Stevens (1757–1837), a member of the Anacreontic Society.

Writing of the year 1777, Stevens recalled: As I have mentioned the Anacreontic Society, it may not be improper to give some account of that Popular meeting.

It was first held at the London Coffee House, on Ludgate Hill, but the room being found too small, it was removed to the Crown and Anchor Tavern in the Strand, then kept by one Holloway.

The best evidence we have for a claim of authorship occurs in his Fifth Book of Canzonets (1799),[12] which included an arrangement of the Anacreontic Song with the ambiguous notation "harmonized by the Author".

The two replaced lines refer to the Society's earlier meeting-place at the London Coffee-House, which was situated on Ludgate Hill and seems to have occupied the same premises as Rowley and Leech, a wine merchant.

[32] Later retitled "The Star-Spangled Banner", Key's lyrics, set to Stafford Smith's music, became a well-known and recognized patriotic song throughout the United States, and was officially designated as the U.S. national anthem on 3 March 1931.