[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 30, Number 38 (Monday, September 26, 1994)]
[Page 1825]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks at a Rhythm and Blues Concert

September 22, 1994

    Thank you, and please be seated. Well, we're a little late and a 
little wet, but I hope that you're as glad to be here as Hillary and I 
are glad to have you here. I want to thank Marilyn Bergman and Frances 
Preston for their leadership in promoting American music and for their 
help in making this evening possible. In this tent tonight, there are 
representatives of many creative disciplines, lyricists, composers, 
authors, photographers, film makers, dramatists, and others. All of you 
have heightened the way the rest of us experience beauty, pleasure, 
pain.
    I can't even begin to contemplate a world without the gifts that you 
have given. I'm also glad you've brought some great performers with you. 
The theme of tonight's program is ``Soul Tree,'' a celebration of the 
roots and reach of American music, soul music, in all of its forms: 
Blues, Gospel, Jazz, Country, Pop, Rhythm and Blues and Rock N' Roll. It 
was all born and bred in America, from Memphis to Motown, from New 
Orleans to New York.
    In Ken Burns' new PBS series on baseball, Gerald Early, a professor 
at Washington University, says that 2,000 years from now when people 
study our civilization, there are only three things America will be 
remembered for, the Constitution, baseball, and jazz. [Laughter] He says 
they're the three most beautifully designed things our culture has 
produced and the three greatest tributes to American improvisation.
    Well, wonderful as it is, and even though I used to teach it, you 
probably don't want to hear my lectures on the Constitution tonight, and 
sadly there is no baseball. So we're left with music, jazz, rhythm and 
blues, all the sounds of America's soul.
    Let's get on with the show. Thank you, and welcome to the White 
House.

Note: The President spoke at 10:36 p.m. on the South Lawn at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to Marilyn Bergman, president, 
American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers, and Frances 
Preston, president and chief executive officer, Broadway Music, Inc. A 
tape was not available for verification of the content of these remarks.