Barrack obama last night hosted a festivity of the music of the civil rights era, describing it as "a movement with a soundtrack".
The president recognized at the start of the evening the debt he owed to those who had risked their lives during the turbulent dismantling of segregation in the 1950s and 1960s, a movement intertwined with music.
"It was music that was not only inspired by the movement, but gave strength in return," Obama said.
At the end of 90 minutes of performance at the White House, he joined the artists on stage. He was pushed to sing a few words of the closing song before, thankfully, allowing himself to be drowned out by those around him, including Smokey Robinson, Jennifer Hudson and Natalie Cole.
Obama's singing might be weaker than his rhetoric but it was better than that of Bob Dylan, who gave the most horrible performance of the night.
Obama said Dylan had interrupted his "never-ending tour" to emerge at the White House. It might have been the near-constant touring, or a cold, or just old age, that added an extra coarseness to his voice. He did not assist by pecking intermittently at his guitar, as if he could not make up his mind whether to play or not.
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