Arts as Advocacy

If you know me, you know that music and the arts sit at the center of my life. A blistering Trey Anastasio solo, a perfectly turned line from Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen, or the familiar ache in Jerry Garcia’s voice — these moments aren’t just entertainment to me. They’re touchstones, reminders of how deeply artistic expression can reach into the human spirit.

I’ve been fortunate to find places where this passion intersects with my professional world. In college, I promoted shows for Walther Productions; after law school, I became HeadCount’s first general counsel; in 2004, I helped found Music for Democracy. Today, I’m proud to represent the Massachusetts International Festival of the Arts (MIFA) as they work to restore and reopen Holyoke’s historic Victory Theatre — a project that blends preservation, economic revitalization, and the timeless power of performance.

For me, the arts have never been a hobby. They’re a form of collective inquiry. When I’m moving with the tide of a Phish crowd, surrounded by thousands of strangers all caught in the same moment, I sometimes think about the power of music. What is it in the human psyche that drives us to these experiences? Is it just the music? Or is it the universal search for meaning and connection?

So what does any of this have to do with 27 South? Quite a lot, actually. For several semesters, I’ve been teaching Argumentation and Advocacy at Emerson College in Boston. Over time, I’ve distilled the craft down to three guiding principles shaped by my work in public policy: be authentic, choose your words intentionally, and know your audience. These aren’t just rules for speeches or op-eds — they’re the backbone of how we communicate meaning.

To help students grasp this, I created a module called “Arts as Argumentation.” It poses big questions: What happens to a piece of art once it’s released into the world? Can art build authentic community? Can a song change anything? To explore those ideas, I bring in musicians and industry leaders — MC Taylor of Hiss Golden Messenger, Eric Hutchinson, Jeff Gorman of Illiterate Light, Jay Sweet from the Newport Folk Festival — each offering their own window into how meaning is made, shared, and transformed.

One of the central themes we discuss is the impossibility of controlling audience interpretation. The minute we speak, write, or sing, the message no longer belongs solely to us. It becomes filtered through each listener’s identity, experience, and worldview. I love hearing artists unpack the intentions behind their work, then comparing that to how I understood it — not to decide who’s “right,” but to appreciate the space between intention and reception. That space is where argumentation lives. It’s also where art reveals its power.

This semester, I invited Dan Wriggins of the band Friendship to speak with my class. His new album, Caveman Wakes Up, has been in steady rotation at my house — one of those records that grabs you from the first track and doesn’t let go. Dan has a remarkable gift for taking seemingly mundane observations and infusing them with deeper symbolism. His storytelling feels effortless, but there’s a complexity beneath the surface that rewards anyone willing to lean in.

The song that hit me hardest was the album’s third track, “Betty Ford.”

Here are the lyrics:

I heard a song today,
Something Jon sent me
About a mission in the rain
The tempo's down
Jerry turns around
Hears the bells ringing for someone else

I saw a video
"The Life of Betty Ford"
Had me tearing up
Because I've been in pain
I've been miles away
And I've done everything I could think of to cover it up

I've been on a mission
Every day of my life
At the top of my game
Stupid high
I have been everyone
I've been so alone
In my Tenderloin
In my Lincoln bedroom

Like many people my age, I’ve long known Betty Ford primarily as a brand through the eponymous substance abuse treatment center that she founded. While stumbling upon a documentary on the former first lady, Dan found the spark for a song. He was struck by how reluctant she had been to enter public life yet how boldly she wielded her platform once she was there. She shared opinions that clashed with her party’s orthodoxy, spoke openly about her breast cancer diagnosis, and later discussed her addiction at a time when such honesty was unthinkable for a political figure.

To Dan, her life embodied a powerful contradiction: a woman with immense visibility and influence yet wrestling with very human vulnerability. That tension became a central thread in the song.

At the same time, Dan was listening to Jerry Garcia’s performance of Mission in the Rain. Garcia, another towering figure of American culture, lived a life marked by public acclaim and private struggle. He helped shape an entire musical era, played for massive audiences, and still battled an addiction that ultimately consumed him. In a poignant twist, the final treatment center he entered before his death happened to be one that Ford herself established — a connection Dan didn’t discover until later.

These parallels and coincidences, two icons, each “on top of their game,” each weighed down by their own battles, created the emotional landscape of the song.

What struck me most in talking with Dan was how the meaning of the song emerged through exploration rather than intention. He didn’t set out to write something heavy-handed or didactic. The themes revealed themselves gradually, shaped by curiosity and empathy. He believes the best songs are the ones that feel immediate, even simple, but deepen when a listener chooses to look closer. Meaning, in that sense, isn’t crafted, it’s uncovered.

His approach reminded me why I care so much about teaching argumentation. At its core, communication is an act of connection. Whether we’re crafting policy, writing a speech, or listening to a song, we’re trying to understand and be understood. When we approach that work with care — when we choose our words thoughtfully, embrace authenticity, and honor our audience’s perspective — we do more than convey information. We build community.

And when we use that community to uplift one another, challenge injustice, or simply ease the quiet burdens we all carry — that’s when art becomes argument, and argument becomes a catalyst for change.