Dear Musician - Politics and Music

It’s almost impossible to escape it these days—Politics. It’s all over the news, and social media is obsessed with it. Some people really thrive on the hype of politics and things of red or blue persuasion. My personal belief – it’s all about opinion, and there are as many opinions as there are backsides upon which we sit!

I recently penned a Dear Musician called “Take a Music Chill Pill,” in which I explained that we really need to escape to music to outrun the political banter overrunning our society.

In recent years I’ve struggled to watch the Grammys because of the political satire. Everyone with an opinion likes to interject it into his or her acceptance speech. Usually the first mention of it  and I’m off to find a rerun of American Pickers. This year, however, I was surprised to find the Grammys reverting back to the love of music. Now, it wasn’t like everyone grabbed hands and sang Kumbaya, but there was a very gracious acknowledgement of the sanctity of music.

"Music is what we all love, music is what it's all about," Alicia Keys said as she hosted. "Everybody is out here shining and I'm so proud to bring us together to honor this moment because music is what we cry to, it's what we march to, it's what we rock to, it's what we make love to. It's our shared global language.” It seemed her words worked to bring everyone back to square one.

All of these thoughts were brought home as I watched a segment of the PBS News Hour in which  Dave Grohl is interviewed about politics and music. He doesn’t hide the fact that some bands have a political undertone, but in the interview he states, "If you put a rock band onstage where everybody knows the songs, people can forget about their differences for a time. Music can do that. That's one of the things that I love about it so much." 

Music seems to defy the notion that water and oil don't mix. Bringing people together from across the aisle, uniting them in song—a great reason to make better music. -HC-

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Dendy Jarrett is the Publisher and Executive Director of Harmony Central. He has been heavily involved at the executive level in many aspects of the drum and percussion industry for over 25 years and has been a professional player since he was 16. His articles and product reviews have been featured in InTune Monthly, Gig Magazine, DRUM! and Modern Drummer Magazines.