The history of American protest music and how it has intersected with politics is the subject of a fascinating new book, On the Record: Music that Changed America, by Anna Harwell Celenza.
Each chapter examines a historical period in which music intersected with politics, sometimes even inspiring legislation. It includes the histories of both “The Star-Spangled Banner” and “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” an exploration of copyright laws that protected everyone from George Gershwin to Sonny Bono, and fascinating chapters on Duke Ellington, Charles Ives, and how the United States government used jazz to fight communism in the 1950s. There are profiles of Bob Dylan, Billie Holiday, and Aaron Copland, who was accused of being a communist, as well as descriptions of how West Side Story was used by politicians to address juvenile delinquency problems. There’s a great analysis of Marvin Gaye’s classic album What’s Going On and how Washington politicians in the 1980s tried to shut down what they saw as offensive forms of popular music.
On the Record is the best kind of popular history. Celenza, a professor at Johns Hopkins University, writes with erudition, a command of the subject matter, and a sense of fun.
Probably the most well-known example of a song that affected society is “Strange Fruit.” When President Joe Biden announced to a group of civil rights advocates and politicians assembled in the Rose Garden that he had just signed into law House Bill 55, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, many of the commentators brought up “Strange Fruit.” It is a protest song written in the 1930s by a high school English teacher named Abel Meeropol, under the pen name Lewis Allan.
“Strange Fruit” was made famous by jazz icon Billie Holiday. The singer Lena Horne once recalled the first time she heard Holiday perform the song: “[She] was putting into words what so many people had seen and lived through. She seemed to be performing in melody and words the same thing I was feeling in my heart.”
There was also “We Shall Overcome,” the great gospel anthem that became a part of the civil rights movement and was quoted by President Lyndon B. Johnson. “For well over a century,” Celenza writes, “various versions of this affirmative phrase had been sung, first by black Americans, and then around the globe, as a call for freedom: freedom from racial oppression, freedom from unfair labor practices, freedom from political injustices. The folk singer and activist Pete Seeger once said: ‘The right song at the right time can change history.’”
Such a song was Marvin Gaye’s 1971 anthem “What’s Going On,” which expressed concern about social issues facing America: “Motown’s smooth, soulful hitmaker, released a song that momentarily changed the landscape of popular music. ‘What’s Going On’ was more than just a hit single; it was a bold departure from the love songs and dance tunes that had defined Gaye’s career up to that point. This introspective, socially conscious anthem spoke directly to the spirit of the times and marked Gaye’s transformation from a pop star into a voice for social change.”
Also explored in On the Record is how music was used to combat communism. In 1958, jazz musician Dave Brubeck, supported by the U.S. government, played a series of concerts in Poland, a country under communist rule. Jazz had been banned in 1949, but the ban was lifted in 1955. One Polish journalist called Brubeck’s concert “a breath of fresh air to local music lovers and jazz aficionados, hungry for live performances of original American jazz.” Crowds followed Brubeck and his band around.
There is also a chapter on the Parents Music Resource Center, the 1980s government committee that sought to restrict access to what had become abrasive and vulgar pop music.
IN FOCUS FORUM: STATE OF THE UNION EDITION
These days, socially conscious music is rare, replaced by the phenomenon of “poptimism,” the idea that consumers should be able to enjoy hit songs that aren’t pushing a message. There’s also the fact that former left-wing punk bands such as Rage Against the Machine have sold out to defend Democratic Party policies, even if those policies hurt the vulnerable, such as girls forced to share a locker room with biological males who identify as transgender.
It all makes one see the wisdom of Johnny Ramone, who once said: “People drift towards liberalism at a young age, and I always hope they change when they see how the world really is.”