Standing in the Shadows of Giants: We Are One

You’ve come a long way, America, since the inauguration of President George W. Bush was “celebrated” by the likes of Brooks and Dunn, Andrew Lloyd Webber, and Wayne Newton. One hint that America had turned a corner came yesterday at 2:20 p.m., ten minutes before HBO went live, when the Right Rev. Gene Robinson — the first openly gay priest to be ordained bishop by the Episcopal church — delivered his invocation. It’s a shame this opening prayer wasn’t on TV, because to hear this man implore the “God of our many understandings” to “bless us with tears” for a billion people around to globe living in poverty, and to grant us freedom “from mere tolerance,” shouldn’t be an amazing thing to hear at an event like this in 2009, but it was.

Unfortunately, even much of the crowd at the event couldn't hear him. The vagaries of running live amplification over as huge an area as Constitution Gardens as well as for live TV would introduce a fascinating Rashomon-like layer to the proceedings, with people in different areas hearing the same things at different times, and sometimes hearing different things altogether.

At 2:30 on the dot, the jumbotrons flicker awake with that “HBO Original Programming” logo, which gets a big cheer. “They’re gonna show The Wire! somebody shouts. For a brief, shining moment it seems We Are One might begin with half a million people doing the HBO Dance a la Screen on the Green, but it isn’t to be.

The aural shell game begins with Army Master Sgt. Caleb Green’s performance of the National Anthem. In the press pit, it sure sounded like he missed a cue and started singing with “the dawn’s early light,” but on TV later, you could see and hear that his performance was flawless. This got more interesting later, during U2’s set, when it sounded like Bono was declaring his support for “a Palestinian dream.” Those watching on TV heard him say something about “an Israeli dream” right before that, but there at the foot of the stage, it sure sounded like Bono was taking sides!

One cool thing about the show was the way that the actors (plus a golf pro, and Martin Luther King III) reading from presidential speeches and correspondence were introduced by name, but the musical acts were not. This lent drama to the musicians’ entrances, and also invited you to guess who would be singing next based on the subject of the speaker’s text. Exhibit A: Denzel Washington, strong and reassuring as ever, observes: “Music has always been the creative heartbeat of the American experience, enriching our lives, lifting our spirits, and touching our deepest emotions.”

And then on walks The Boss, announcing himself with a single chord from his acoustic guitar. A backdrop of Greek columns like the ones holding up the roof of the Lincoln Memorial slides away to reveal a crimson-cloaked gospel choir singing the chorus of “The Rising,” Bruce’s eulogy for a firefighter who perishes at Ground Zero in New York City. Bruce gives it his all, but it’s a surprisingly sober performance even given the song’s subject — I’ve heard him perform this song in concert many times, and it usually feels a lot more celebratory. Hey, it’s hard to go first at a thing like this. The song ends somewhat abruptly and Bruce gestures to acknowledge the choir before walking quickly off.

Bruce spoke eloquently on behalf of the President-Elect during the campaign, but today he’s just here to sing, apparently. This speaks well of his modesty, but does not necessarily portend good things for the show. The election of Barack Obama tells us nothing if not that America is a lot cooler than we thought it was! We need our celebrities, our professional crazy people, to let it all hang out.

Fortunately, Jamie Foxx will be on soon.

Laura Linney and Martin Luther King III come out to talk about Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal and John F. Kennedy’s creation of the Peace Corps, reminding us that the President-Elect has designated tomorrow as a National Day of Service. This, it turns out, is foreplay for Mary J. Blige to sing “Lean on Me.” She sounds great, and the President-Elect is wearing a huge smile throughout her performance. But didn’t any of the TV people tell her that dressing all in white is a bad idea when her backdrop is the Lincoln Memorial? She looks like a disembodied head, albeit one that’s having a bit of trouble in its spike-heeled boots.

Steve Carrell is so closely identified with his role on “The Office” of bonehead boss Michael Scott — a man forever misquoting venerable sources like, um, the movie Braveheart — that you can’t possibly listen to him quoting Thomas Jefferson without waiting for a punchline that never comes. It’s weird.

Not to fear, Foxx is here! After reverently citing Thurgood Marshall, he reminisces about the celebration in Chicago’s Grant Park on election night: “Chi-town, stand up! Three one two!” — before affecting a pitch-perfect Obama impression to quote the President-Elect’s victory speech. It’s genuinely funny, and it at least appears to be spontaneous, and seems to loosen everybody up. (He even tells the TelePromTer operator, “Wait, go back down.”) Jamie Foxx, you are the MVP of the show.

Bettye LaVette was a too-long overlooked soul shoulda-been legend who actually had her first hit the year before Sam Cooke wrote the extraordinary “A Change Is Gonna Come.” Of course she can sing the hell out of this song. And her perfect duet partner? Why, it’s Jon Bon Jovi, of course! I don’t know how this happened, but it’s not awful. And the way LaVette and Bon Jovi make googly eyes at each other throughout the performance, it’s pretty clear that they had more chemistry at their first (?) meeting than LaVette did the first time she met Drive-By Truckers frontman Patterson Hood.

That isn’t a John Williams score the orchestra is playing now; it’s “The Lincoln Portrait,” composed by Aaron Copland soon after the U.S. entered World War II. And that’s Tom Hanks reading Copland’s text, a mashup of various Lincoln speeches: “Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history . . . We must disenthrall ourselves, and so we shall save our country.” If that’s true, the country won’t be saved by me, because I’m on the verge of crying like a damn baby. I hate hate “Forrest Gump,” but no wonder this guy has two Oscars on his mantle. Then again, patriotic profundity is probably not the hardest thing in the world to convey when your backing band is Abe Lincoln and Aaron Copland.

Hey, are Secret Service agents not allowed to wear hats? Is the president? It’s cold out here, Fellas!

Oh, wait, I know why they’re not wearing hats. Because James Taylor is wearing one, and he looks insane. The two people, a man and a woman, who begin his performance of “Shower the People” with him, are never identified. They’re soon joined by John Legend and Jennifer Nettles. Nice. It works.

Joe Biden sounds a little bit funny riffing on “the dignity of work,” but it’s a reasonable set up for the onetime Johnny Cougar, the crew-cutted, perennially gum-chewing John Mellencamp. On TV, his performance of “Pink Houses” is intercut with weird stock shots of people at work. We hear the choir behind him before the façade slides away and we see them, but here’s a song that really benefits from the choral support. The audience loves it! It doesn’t quite come across on TV maybe, but here in the cold, it's the first musical home run of the show. (Watching HBO's replay of the broadcast later, my girlfriend will note the similarity between “Pink Houses” and “America: Fuck Yeah!” from the soundtrack to Team America: World Police. )

Now it’s Queen Latifah talking about Marian Anderson getting shut out by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1935, because of their whites-only policy at Constitution Hall. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt stepped up the plate and invited Ms. Anderson to sing “My Country, ‘Tis of Thee” at the Lincoln Memorial instead.

When Josh Groban walks out to sing the song with Heather Headley, there are jeers in the press pit, but obviously that’s just because we’re all America-hating liberals. It’s time for a Balance Bar! Nutritious and satisfying, but it still tastes like a chocolate bar. Well, a chocolate-flavored sawdust bar, but you get used to it after a while, and eventually you can persuade yourself they taste good. Pairs surprisingly well with coffee.

Jesus, is Groban still singing? How long is this song?

Then, it’s George Lopez and Kumar. Or Harold. One of them. Kal Penn is his real name, a natural choice to quote JFK and introduce Will.i.am, Sheryl Crow, and Herbie Hancock, doing a better-than-serviceable “One Love” that gets the President-Elect bobbing his head. Halfway through the song, the reporter next to me with the Fox News tag on his bag scratches out “Stevie Wonder” in his notebook and writes in “Herbie H.” Will.i.am, the Fox guy notes, is wearing “his trademark fedora.” Fox News called that one exactly right. Sheryl Crow looks like she’s having the time of her life, though I’m not sure her guitar is actually plugged in.

Did you know Tiger Woods’ dad was a special forces operator? Probably you did. I don’t know much about golf. Tiger introduces the U.S. Naval Academy Glee Club performing the Rodgers and Hammerstein Carousel showtune “You’ll Never Walk Alone.” It’s a fine choice for a tribute to service members and their families. Opera singer Renee Fleming wears a blazing red raincoat. She had better fashion advice than Mary J. Blige, apparently.

Jack Black comes on to talk about Theodore Roosevelt’s legacy of conservation. It’s a dubious tie in to Garth Brooks performing Don McLean’s “America Pie,” but okay. “Did you write the book of love, yeeeeaaaaahhh!” he demands, pointing at people like he's, I don't know, Garth Brooks.

You know what? People love this guy. You’d think it was 1992 from the way they’re going crazy listening to him sing this song from 1972. Apparently no one else is troubled by the aesthetic dissonance of the headset-and-cowboy-hat combo.

Garth is the first performer to get to stay on for more than one song. “Shout” is next. “Lookin’ great!” he tells the crowd. All the camera lenses in the press pit swivel south to catch tens of thousands of people dancing. Then Garth sings his own “We Shall Be Free.” As a civil rights anthem, it’s a far cry from “A Change is Gonna Come,” but how can you argue with the result? Garth finishes his set by shouting, “God Bless America! God bless the world! Love one another!” I hate to say this, but Garth Brooks has stolen the show. Maybe Jamie Foxx will come back later.

Brooks gets a hug from Forrest Whittaker as he walks out. Why does his co-presenter — co-speaker, whatever — Ashley Judd sound so out of breath? She quotes JFK from Amherst college, the same text that’s on the wall at the Kennedy Center. Forrest Whittaker goes for William Faulnker: “The poet's voice need not merely to be the record of man. It can be one of the props, the pillars to help him endure and prevail." Well, that sure says Usher Raymond IV to me!

Usher remains uncharacteristically clothed (it’s 40 degrees out), doing some standard call-and-response stuff. The backdrop opens to reveal Stevie Wonder playing the keyboard vamp to “Higher Ground.” Usher sings the first verse, Shakira takes the second, then Stevie. Barrack’s head-bop to this one is kind of funny, more of a lateral move. Steve Wonder adds an impromptu “Bar-ack O-bamaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!” at the end. Nice touch.

Ladies and Gentleman, Samuel L. Jackson! “America, I have had it with these motherfuckin’ snakes on this motherfuckin’ plane!” he declares. No, totally kidding. He quotes Rosa Parks: “I didn’t get on the bus to get arrested. I got on the bus to go home.” I’ve already noticed U2 running into place behind, so it’s just a question of how efficiently the star of “Pulp Fiction” will cover the not-too-expansive rhetorical ground from Rosa Parks to MLK to U2’s “Pride (In the Name of Love)" Talking about the 1963 March on Washington where King gave the “I have a dream speech,” Jackson says, “That was a day we all remember.” It's an odd thing to say. What's odder still is that he's right.

Somewhere, a finger hovers over a bleep-for-broadcast button, because Bono has a microphone. “On this spot, 48 years ago — 46 years ago! — Dr. King had a dream. On Tuesday, that dream comes to pass!” Bono didn’t think Jackson’s set up was sufficient, apparently. U2 haven’t performed “Pride” this high up on the scale in 15 years, and you can hear why — Bono, who wrote the song when he was half his current age of 48, is struggling, but it makes the performance more dramatic. He makes a factual correction to the song’s original lyric, noting that Dr. King was assassinated in the “Early evening, April 4.”

At the climax of the anthem, Bono recycles and updates some patter from U2’s last tour: “Not just an American dream! Also an Irish dream! Also a European dream! Also an African dream, an Israeli dream, and also, a Palestinian dream!” We only heard the "Palestinian" part in the press pit. The President-elect looks concerned when the camera catches him after Bono says that.

“Let freedom ring!” Bono shouts. “In every hamlet! Every village! Every state!” It seems like he’s trying really hard to get to “In every city” so he can say, “Of blinding lights!” The recorded piano intro to “City of Blinding Lights” has already started up, a little too early. “What a thrill for four Irish boys from the north side of Dublin to be here to honor you, Sir!,” Bono says to the President-Elect, which would have been a perfect place for him to start singing again. But being Bono, he has to continue, noting that Obama “chose this song to be part of the soundtrack for your campaign!” I love you, Bono, but that’s a douche move, Man. Maybe he knows that crowd won’t know this one. Last time Bono performed on the Mall, on New Year’s Eve 1999, he sang “One,” which probably would have gone over better here, at the event called We Are One.

Bono’s modifying lyrics on the fly: “America, your road will rise under Lincoln’s unblinking eyes! They’re advertising in the skies for people like you — Joe Biden!” Biden looks confused. Can you blame him?

U2’s performance actually plays better on TV than it did live. He’s a pro, that Bono. Oh, shit: Bono’s doing that fellating-the-camera thing he used to do during the Zoo TV Tour. Bad idea, Bono! At the end of the song, he sits down on the steps, stage left, like he’s tired. Again, it looks better on TV.

In HBO's replay broadcast, U2’s performance cuts right to the introduction of the President-Elect, omitting the most awkward thee minutes of the show. “Ladies and gentlemen, Challenger — a male from the American Eagle foundation!” The falconer walks out with the eagle strapped to his arm. It's not clear whether he’s trying to get Challenger to fly or what, but that bird flaps its mighty wings and goes nowhere. It appears to be strapped to its keeper’s forearm. At least nobody shouts “free bird!” Instead of moving on, the announcer says, “Challenger’s friend, Mr. Lincoln!” There is a second bird handler on the TV screens holding another, equally pissed-off eagle, but I could not see the second bird handler on stage. This would have been good television.

Finally, Barack!

He thanks the people “Who came because you believe in what America can be, and you want to help us get there.” Chants of O! Ba! Ma! ripple forward from the Washington Monument.

Bruce is back: “We’d like you to join us in perhaps the greatest song ever written about our home.” Eighty-nine-year-old Pete Seeger says, "You sing it with us!" He recites each line of Woody Guthrie’s “This Land Is Your Land” before Bruce and Pete’s grandson sing it, backed again by a choir. The elder Seeger looks happier than anybody I’ve ever seen, raising his arms, with effort, to implore us to raise our much younger arms. (Yes, I'm making an assumption here.) They go through all the verses of the song, even the ones that are usually omitted, and that still come off as kind of edgy more than six decades later. What a performance.

What could follow this? Beyonce singing “America the Beautiful.” She’s good, but it seems anticlimactic, especially considering that Woody Guthrie wrote “This Land Is Your Land” as an angry response to “God Bless America,” believing Irving Berlin had missed the perspective of the common man in the latter encomium.

“America, can you feel it?" asks Sasha Fierce. "Stand up! Sing with me!" And here comes everybody, the whole all-star lineup, back on stage! Bono whispers something to Bettye LaVette that makes her laugh very hard. Everyone stays in place as a kind of receiving line, the President-Elect working his way down. Samuel L. Jackson whips out a digital camera and snaps a picture of the crowd on the Mall. Stevie Wonder is blowing on his harmonica, off mic, apparently for his own amusement.

It’s gonna be a rough few years. Our President-Elect, to his credit, just reminded us of this a few minutes ago. What's that called, when someone can deliver bad news but still make you feel strong and optimistic enough to take it? Oh, right: leadership. We Are One actually was, against the odds, something close to the party America deserves before it begins the difficult work ahead.