Tim McGraw and co-author and historian Jon Meacham's recent book tour for Songs of America: Patriotism, Protest, and the Music That Made a Nation offered McGraw a chance to sing some of the songs in the book, including this rendition of Lee Greenwood's "God Bless the USA."
The footage, posted by Raleigh, North Carolina radio station 94.7 QDR, likely came from the tour's final stop: June 24 at the Raleigh Memorial Auditorium. It was a limited-engagement tour with just six East Coast dates.
Each show doubled as a McGraw concert in an intimate setting and an in-person history lesson from Meacham, the Pulitzer biographer of Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson and George H.W. Bush.
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Per a press release, "Songs of America is at its heart a celebration of America and the music that has inspired us. Through years of strife and triumph, America has been shaped not only by our leaders, our words and our deeds, but by our music—by the lyrics, performers and instrumentals that have carried us through dark days and enabled us to celebrate bright ones. From the 'Star Spangled Banner' to 'Born in the USA,' Meacham and McGraw take us on a journey illuminating the eras of history through the music of those times—from the Revolutionary War to the present—that helped define American culture."
The same press release quotes high praise from Ken Burns, the filmmaker behind this fall's Country Music docu-series: "This is an unusually well written and moving story; it's about us and U.S. all at the same time—as intimate as it is majestic in scope and reach."
Greenwood's "God Bless the USA" debuted as a single in 1984, but it did not enter the songbook of patriotic anthems until the Gulf War in 1990 and 1991. The song saw renewed interest after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
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