Not nearly enough Americans are aware that much of what the country considers America’s most patriotic music was created by artists and writers with decidedly left-wing sympathies. Another form of historical amnesia. Many of the songs speak to the potential, as opposed to the (unrealized) material reality, of the country’s highest ideals. In that spirit, here is my highly debatable list of Top 15 Fourth of July Songs, presented in random order. These songs, taken together, make clear what’s special about the US while highlighting the enormous amount of work that needs to be done.
1. Los Lobos with Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir, This Land is Your Land
This rambling version of the iconic Woody Guthrie song was performed in July, 1989 backstage at the Alpine Valley Music Theater in East Troy, Wisconsin between sets on that summer’s Los Lobos/Grateful Dead tour.
2. Bruce Springsteen, Chimes of Freedom
Sony Music has made it difficult to watch Bob Dylan performing his classic ode to “the refugees on their unarmed road of flight.” Fortunately, Bruce Springsteen acquits himself well in this live 1988 cover.
3. Paul Robeson, The House I Live In
Written in 1943 by Abel Meeropol under the pen name Lewis Allen, this tune became a patriotic anthem during World War II with its populist evocation of everyday American life.
4. Phil Ochs, The Power and Glory
One of the songs that established Ochs’s formidable reputation, he saw it as a patriotic hymn connecting the American dream to selfless, faith-based ideals.
5. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir, The Battle Hymn of the Republic
“The Battle Hymn of the Republic” was written in 1861 by abolitionist, social activist, and poet Julia Ward Howe, set to music composed by William Steffe.
6. Loretta Lynn, Dear Uncle Sam
This Vietnam-era plea on behalf of soldier-husbands everywhere resonated far beyond the traditional, antiwar crowd when it was released in 1968.
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7. Johnny Cash, Ragged Old Flag
Using a small town’s tattered old flag as a symbol of America’s conflicted history, Cash’s spoken word testimony on heroism, strife, loss, victory, scandal, and abuse offers a capsule lesson in American history.
8. Rosanne Cash, 500 Miles
Originally written by Hedy West, this song became popular in the US during the 1960s folk revival and was included on a list of 100 essential American songs that Johnny Cash famously bequeathed to his daughter Rosanne. In 2009, she produced a brilliant album featuring her versions of 12 of the 100, including this one.
9. Leontyne Price, America the Beautiful
Written in 1893 by Katharine Lee Bates, an English professor at Wellesley College, this song not only speaks to the natural beauty of America but also expresses Bates’s view that US imperialism undermines the nation’s core values. In this version, opera star Leontyne Price performs at a 1992 benefit concert.
10. Gil Scott-Heron, Winter in America
One of the great Scott–Heron’s most well-received compositions, this bluesy lament mourns America’s lost promise: “And ain’t nobody fighting,/ ’Cause nobody knows what to save.”
11. Sarah Ogan Gunning, Come All Ye Coal Miners
This song gives voice to the frequently forgotten workers whose hard labor built the foundation and infrastructure of modern America.
12. Simon & Garfunkel, America
Inspired by a 1964 road trip across the US, new meaning was infused into this song for a younger generation in 2016 by Bernie Sanders’s now-famous commercial.
13. Jay-Z and Kanye West, Made in America
While detailing their rags-to-riches American dream stories, these hip-hop superstars reflect on black history and their role in uplifting that legacy.
14. Prince, America
Prince wrote this funk-rock protest song in 1985 calling out the oft-ignored underbelly of the country he loved and demanding it do better.
15. Childish Gambino, This is America
Childish Gambino aka Donald Glover has said this song is about the “violent contradictions of being Black in America.”
