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The American Dream: Past, Present and Future. Ever since James Truslow Adams coined the phrase in 1931, each generation has rendered the American Dream in its own image. Today, we face a variety of crises that have rudely awakened us. Our nation is sharply divided over the values that should prevail. We no longer know what we aspire to. The materials collected on this blog will become the source material for a live Performance Installation at Palomar College in April of 2010.
The Epic of America
If you tie the definition of the American Dream solely to degree of material wealth, you won't find much music to fit ("Money Money," and, uh, ...?). If you're talking about the American spirit, however, you've got everything from traditional "negro" spirituals (Alvin Ailey's "Revelations" is considered the American cultural ambassador) Louis Armstrong, Civil War anthems, Stephen Foster, and of course country. Woodstock groups, all kinds of kicking Broadway musicals,folk music. Buddy Holly to Elvis to...Madonna? "I Hear America Singing" from the muscial Working. Part of the American Spirit is the freedom not to be confined to any genre, no less any one song.
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