America At 250: Still Under Construction

Good Morning,Happy 250th. Fitting that today’s stories keep circling the question the country has never settled: what is American culture, and who gets to say? There’s a case for George Bristow’s “Niagara” — a choral finale that outscales Beethoven’s Ninth — as the first great American symphony (Early Music America). Stephen Foster, born on the nation’s 50th birthday, turns 200 today still singing to America’s contradictions (The Conver