CNN Sountracks: Songs the Defined History “Kent State & The Vietnam War”

I love this series.  I haven’t seen them all, but I intend to... music is such a powerful force in history, the shared bedrock of our collective experiences.  This series celebrates how the musical arts and history are intertwined, how one encourages the other forward.  Music is society’s momentum,  powerful and persistent.

Specifically, the late 60s to early 70s was a fractious time in American culture, and not surprisingly saw a deluge of music, politically-driven and influential.  Musicians forged the American experience and gave voice to both sides of the discourse, although hardly equitably.  Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young  — it’s impossible to imagine the popular music of today without these seminal influencers.

This series, this episode in particular, is a thumb in the eye of every person who believes artists (athletes, celebrities, entertainers - take your pick) should just shut up and do their job.  As such, Kent State & the Vietnam War is as much a testament to Colin Kaepernick as it is to Jeffery Miller, Allison Krause, William Schroeder and Sandra Scheuer, the four unarmed students gunned down by their government at Kent State.  

Apathy is a luxury we can ill afford in our current crisis of Democracy.

Joan Baez, arrested for the first time, 1967

And in case you’re feeling like today’s artists don’t have the same power to inform, then just hang on for the last five minutes of this episode.  I won’t give it away here, but yowzah! The central message is that art not only reflects society but creates it as well. Even today, musical diamonds are forged by the unrelenting crush of society, you just have to be listening.