The U.S. is turning 250. These songs unexpectedly changed American history.

**David Greene** (0:04)
This is In Conversation from Apple News. I'm David Greene in for Shumita Basu. Today, the music that changed America.
This summer marks the 250th anniversary of the United States, and many of us are taking time to reflect on our history and the forces that have made America what it is today. As I was reflecting on how to mark this milestone, I thought about an art form that unites us, brings us joy, and has the ability to affect great change, music.

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (0:43)
I wanted to have us see the power that music can have in our political world.

**David Greene** (0:48)
That's Anna Harwell Celenza, a musicology professor at Johns Hopkins University and the author of the book On the Record, Music That Changed America. Her book tells the story of a range of musical works, from The Star-Spangled Banner all the way to Hamilton, that whether the artist intended to or not changed how Americans think about the issues that define us, and sometimes even motivated lawmakers to act. I sat down with Anna to explore her four favorite examples from the book, how they show up in our lives today, and why music is at the heart of America's story.
We can't talk about our nation having a big birthday without talking about The Star-Spangled Banner.

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (1:31)
Right.

**David Greene** (1:31)
And you do focus on that in the book, and talk about that the song really was imbued with different meanings and different political purposes over its lifetime. Let's start with what the political climate was when Francis Scott Key composed these lyrics in 1814

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (1:48)
Yeah. So we were in the final bits of the War of 1812, and Francis Scott Key was a lawyer. He lived in Washington, DC, but he was also in Baltimore. The British had just basically burned Washington, DC to the ground, and Baltimore was the last holdout. So he witnesses this bombing of Fort McHenry, and the next day sees that despite the British bombing, the Baltimoreans had hung in there and the American flag goes up as the sun comes over the horizon. He writes these lyrics with this great feeling of victory and patriotism and this thing. Right from the beginning though, he picks a tune called To Anacreon in Heaven. It's a song that had been written in Britain. It was a men's drinking song for a sort of aristocratic men's club. And that's sort of how the song takes off. It doesn't become the national anthem until 1931
And in all that time in between, there were lots of songs that were kind of negotiating to be the song that gets used at official events to represent the United States.
I also should note I put this song in connection to Lift Every Voice and Sing, which was composed around 1900 And the reason for that is I think we are still sort of having a debate in our society about what does represent America. And that's a theme I talk about in a lot of ways. What's the American sound? What's the American idea? What's the American concept?
And so The Star-Spangled Banner from the beginning was a protest song. I mean, people got upset when Colin Kaepernick took a knee and said, oh, how dare you do this? But from the very beginning, you had groups on the far right and the far left. You had suffragettes. You had abolitionists. You had folks that were pro-prohibition.

**David Greene** (3:56)
All using this song is for their own kind of messaging and agenda.

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (4:00)
Exactly. It's like, hey, let's add a new lyric and change what this song means.

**David Greene** (4:05)
Why was this song, The Star-Spangled Banner, ultimately chosen as the song? What was that conversation like in the 1930s?

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (4:12)
Well, first of all, the Maryland senators and members of the House of Congress were very adamant about they wanted this to be the one. So they fought very hard, long and hard.

**David Greene** (4:23)
Lobbying has always been alive and well in our country.

**Anna Harwell Celenza** (4:26)
Exactly. But the big push was the fact that we were really witnessing the height of the stock market crash from 1929 Our country was economically in a shambles. We were divided very strongly politically. There was the far right and the far left. There were those who were very, very wealthy and those who weren't.
What you see in the 30s is Congress working really hard to come up with ways to unify the country.
The Star-Spangled Banner was one of those things. They wanted to create some secular rituals so that there are things we do in public spheres that make us feel united. And so, the Star-Spangled Banner became that. We are at sporting events before classical music concerts, at high school graduations. This is the song that we are going to stand up and put our hand over our chest. And we are going to sing this song together, and it will create a sense of unity in coming together.