I found this New Republic essay by art critic Jed Perl (New Art City and others) after writing the post below, and it’s nice to find yourself on the same page as someone like Perl without knowing it. Perl states that
“[W]hat mattered in the early 1960s was not what JFK knew about Casals or the music of Schumann and Couperin and Mendelssohn. What mattered was that Casals was performing at the White House, a great day for the arts in America that also served to remind Americans that art has no borders, that a Spaniard playing German music in Washington was indeed part of the American experience.”
That’s also what I think was most notable in the Perlman-Ma-Montero-McGill performance at Barack Obama’s inauguration, vastly above and beyond the actual music they played. It’s symbolism that counts, and as Perl writes:
“[W]hen it comes to Obama and the arts, symbolism really matters. Symbolism, at least at the outset, may be all we have.”
Symbolically, the musicians’ presence on the stage spoke volumes, before they even played a note.
Read the entire essay; there’s a lot in there to keep in mind as we start mulling over this whole “arts czar” idea.