Singing about politics is like dancing about architecture. You can give it everything you have, you can make crowds believe in you, and yet there is something ultimately mendacious about it. The toolset you have at your disposal just doesn't function properly when used for something it wasn't designed for.

That's not to say that musicians don't have a right to free speech. During my student years at the Prague Conservatory, we used to argue about politics now and then, and since young Czechs have right-leaning tendencies, we were in agreement more often than not. What we didn't do was to organize a concert in support of Cuban political prisoners. No one went on stage with words The Brahms sonata I am about to play means Bill Clinton is a cool guy. We wanted to play well, we wanted to feed our inner genius, we loved to bathe in public adoration and dodged criticism.

Perhaps the idea of doing anything but playing music (and drinking beer after the concert) have never entered our minds because we didn't have such a large audience as, say, Bruce Springsteen. Perhaps there is a moment when you can sing for so many people that you start wondering, I could also talk to them, I could make them think what I want them to think. One way or another, this is a good opportunity to not open your mouth.

Bruce Springsteen has, and although he says We've been misled, it's him who's been misled and is misleading others. He spilled his guts in this Rolling Stone interview, and there is enough material to uncover the misconception that drives him and dozens of his peers where they don't belong.

I always felt that the musician's job, as I experienced it growing up, was to provide an alternative source of information, a spiritual and social rallying place, somewhere you went to have a communal experience.

I don't know if someone is going to run to the front of the stage and shout, "I'm saved" or "I'm switching," but I'm going to try. I will be calling anyone in a bow tie to come to the front of the stage, and I'll see what I can do.

So the musician's job is not to provide a quality source of music, but a 'communal experience'?

What do you think the responsibility of the artist is in society?

There is a long tradition of the artist being involved in the life of the nation. For me, it goes back to Woody Guthrie, James Brown, Curtis Mayfield and Bob Dylan. These were all people who were alternative sources of information. When Dylan hit in the mid-Sixties, he brought with him as true a reading of what was going on as was out there.

Does it make me conservative if I believe that the sole responsibility of an artist in a society is to make art -- for as long as he and his audience have a satisfactory relationship? Few people have more than one significant talent, and success in the primary activity doesn't guarantee equal achievement in another. Paul Hindemith was a terrific composer, writer, teacher, and a practicing musician (he played several instruments). He was an exception to the rule. Bruce Springsteen confirms the rule:

The press has let the country down. It's taken a very amoral stand, in that essential issues are often portrayed as simply one side says this and the other side says that. I think that Fox News and the Republican right have intimidated the press into an incredible self-consciousness about appearing objective and backed them into a corner of sorts where they have ceded some of their responsibility and righteous power.

The press has let the country down in many ways imaginable, starting in the 60s when America lost a war universally hated in the media. Alas, it's not what Bruce meant. The interview proves what many have been saying for a long time, that people living the life of a pop or Hollywood star have no clue about what's really going on in the real world. It also says that they may sing well but forgot what music really is about.

Music is music is music. See?