Jay Nordlinger is a senior resident fellow at the Renew Democracy Initiative and a contributor at The Next Move.
Concert halls have been filled with American music this year as our country marks its 250th anniversary. A self-consciously American concert took place at Lincoln Center, in New York, a couple of Sundays ago.
The sponsoring organization was the Together in Hope Project, based in Minneapolis. The organization has been carrying out a project within a project: Sing Democracy 250. The motto of this project is “Uniting in harmony to renew democracy’s promise.”
That is something to get the attention of a music critic who is affiliated with the Renew Democracy Initiative. (I have been the music critic of The New Criterion, the monthly arts-and-letters journal, for many years.)
A co-founder of the Together in Hope Project, Celia Ellingson, made some remarks before the concert at Lincoln Center. She concluded her remarks by saying that we Americans must do all we can “to ensure that our democracy is not just remembered but renewed for the next 250 years.”
On hand were three choirs, combined. One of them was a local group: the “oratorio choir” from Stuyvesant High School, an institution better known for its scientific whizzes than for its musicians. Playing with the choirs was the Main Line Symphony Orchestra, from Greater Philadelphia.
These forces were conducted by G. Phillip Shoultz III—GPS3. He also served as a kind of emcee for the evening. In his remarks to the audience—about democracy and its challenges—he sounded like a civic pastor.
The concert began, fittingly enough, with the national anthem. It was in A flat, rather than the customary B flat. And it had been arranged by Shoultz himself. It is a skillful, pleasing arrangement, different enough to be ear-catching, not so different as to be distracting or self-advertising.
There were two big works on the program, beginning with Redeem the Dream, a kind of oratorio. It was composed by Brandon A. Boyd, who works at the University of Missouri.
Redeem the Dream begins with lines from the Declaration of Independence—the most famous lines of all: “We hold these truths to be self-evident …” It continues with a canonical American poem: “Let America Be America Again,” written in 1935 by Langston Hughes.
The poem calls on America to live up to its promises and standards and ideals. To be its best self.
ICYMI: Tune in to the latest episode of the Older/Wiser Podcast
At the beginning of this year, I reviewed a new work called American Lament, which sets parts of the Hughes poem. Music aside, I objected to bowdlerization.
“For instance, ‘every man’ becomes ‘everyone,’ ‘Indian’ becomes ‘Native,’ ‘Negro’ becomes ‘black man,’ and so on. Is that really necessary? Wouldn’t an audience understand that different words and phrases have been used in different eras?”
In any case, Redeem the Dream leaves Hughes in the original, which is wise. He is hard to edit or improve on. He knows rhythm and phrasing—and sensibility—better than most of us do.
Today, I am not wearing my music critic’s hat, but I will comment briefly on Brandon A. Boyd’s work, this semi-oratorio, if you will. It is eclectic. It has flavors of jazz, swing, pop, gospel. The choirs sometimes swayed back and forth, and the audience sometimes clapped along.
The work is full of affection, in addition to eclecticism. I was reminded, in some sections, of Wynton Marsalis’s Abyssinian Mass (2008).
After Redeem the Dream came US, another “semi-oratorio” (although maybe I can do without the prefix, in both cases). As Richard Haass explained in introductory remarks from the stage, the title refers to “us,” as in “We the People,” but also to the United States.
Richard Haass? The American diplomat who for 20 years was the president of the Council on Foreign Relations? What was he doing there?
In 2023, Haass published a book called The Bill of Obligations: The Ten Habits of Good Citizens. And it is on this book that US is based.
The composer is Michael Bussewitz-Quarm, “whose music engages with pressing social and environmental issues.” (I have quoted from the composer’s bio.)
US is not dissimilar to Redeem the Dream, in that it is eclectic, affirmative, and listenable. One might groove along to it, as many a chorister did (and some audience members too).
The first of Richard Haass’s ten good habits is “Be informed.” The second is “Get involved.” The third, “Support the teaching of civics” (amen). The fourth, “Remain civil.” They are all pretty good, and well-nigh inarguable.
Unusual for a libretto, this particular one is mainly a series of quotations, from a range of Americans. These include presidents: Jefferson, Lincoln, FDR, JFK, Reagan, George W. Bush, Obama.
Other Americans include Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Harvey Milk, John McCain, and James Mattis. That’s variety.
I like what Frederick Douglass says, under “Be informed”: “A little learning, indeed, may be a dangerous thing, but the want of learning is a calamity to any people.”
Here is Wilma Mankiller, the Cherokee leader, under “Get involved”: “The desire to do something and contribute was stronger than the fear of speaking up.”
One of Haass’s ten good habits is “Stay open to compromise.” Naturally, we hear from the Great Compromiser, Henry Clay: “All legislation, all government, all society, is founded upon the principle of mutual concession.”
I quite like what JFK says, in this same category: “Compromise need not mean cowardice. Indeed it is frequently the compromisers and conciliators who are faced with the severest tests of political courage.”
When I was coming of age, I heard Reagan say, over and over, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction.” I used to roll my eyes a little. Sure, he was right in theory, I thought, but in practice? Suffice it to say, I don’t roll my eyes anymore.
This quotation is included in US.
The concert ended as it began, with an anthem: “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” popularly known as “the black national anthem.” Is this separatist? It is complementary, I think, and, regardless, it is a great entry in the American treasury.
“Lift Every Voice” became an issue in the 2008 presidential campaign, believe it or not. (This was Obama vs. McCain.) I wrote about it, here.
The song was written in 1900 to celebrate Lincoln’s birthday. The music is by J. Rosamond Johnson and the words are by his brother, James Weldon Johnson. If you will indulge a personal memory: I had the pleasure of teaching “Lift Every Voice” to summer campers in 1983, between my freshman and sophomore years of college.
This concert at Lincoln Center—Sing Democracy 250—was maybe a little corny, a little hokey. But that is so much better than cynical or nihilistic—or unpatriotic. The worse politics looks, the more we depend on civil society, which includes people who lift up their voice and sing.
The Renew Democracy Initiative, publisher of The Next Move, is pleased to join the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, publisher of The UnPopulist, as a media partner for the third annual Liberalism for the 21st Century Conference—LibCon 2026—in Washington, DC on July 16 and 17. Click here for more information and to register. Coinciding with America’s 250th anniversary, the theme of the conference is the Reconstruction Agenda. The conference will assess the damage that authoritarian and demagogic politics have caused to the country’s liberal institutions and propose a path forward to rebuild accountability and confidence in the rule of law. The conference features a stellar lineup, including RDI Advisory Board Member Anne Applebaum and RDI Vice Chair Linda Chavez, along with Francis Fukuyama, David French, Hong Kong dissident Nathan Law and many more. We’ll be there and so should you.
More from The Next Move:
 | A guest post by
|
I love this and I want to make a contribution. Here’s a link to a piece I recently animated to Woody Guthrie’s ‘This is Your Land’. I have licensed use of the song through next year for internet and festival use (but not broadcast).Please use it in any way you wish. Let me know if you need anything. I’ll try to DM you.
https://vimeo.com/1096145803