Do You Hear the People Sing?

Ema Velasco, UVI, unravels the history, and future, of the arts being used as tools of resistance.

Last week, as the elite mingled in their finery at Donald Trump’s governors’ ball at the White House, an unexpected revolutionary moment unfolded. The US Army Choir entered the ballroom performing a medley of songs from “Les Misérables” — a musical famous for its themes of protest, revolution, and the fight against tyrannical government overreach.

The irony was lost on no one. Except, perhaps, those who should have noticed it most.

As the choir members circled the room singing the reprise of “Do You Hear the People Sing?” followed by “One Day More,” they were spelling out a message of resistance in the very heart of power. Across history, the arts have served as humanity’s most enduring form of resistance against oppression; music in particular. Yet there is a profound paradox at work. Although music has been wielded to fight against powers throughout human history, it exists in part because of oppressors. Those with authority have long understood the power and influence of the arts, often deploying them as instruments of subjugation rather than liberation. The arts recognise what revolutionaries like Che Guevara understood when he said, “The revolution is not an apple that falls when it is ripe. You have to make it fall.” Art, like revolution, requires action and intent.

As a musician and the daughter of a political exile, I am drawn to the dance between resistance and oppression, and to the influence and unifying power of the arts. How can music and art serve both as instruments of oppression and tools of resistance? What is the difference between art that controls and art that liberates? What makes artistic works powerful enough to challenge entrenched powers? These questions echo through concert halls and street protests alike, defining the soundtrack of social change.

Just two weeks before the Army Choir’s inadvertent act of musical resistance, another striking performance unfolded before an even larger audience — and with the same oblivious spectator in attendance.

Against a backdrop of dancers dressed in patriotic colours who at one point formed a U.S. flag split dramatically down the middle, Kendrick Lamar didn’t so much perform as he prophesied.

“The revolution is about to be televised, you picked the right time but the wrong guy,” he declared, words cutting through the celebration. “They tried to rig the game, but you can’t fake influence,” he continued, before invoking powerful historical imagery: “40 acres and a mule, this is bigger than the music” — referring to the unfulfilled government promise made to freed slaves after the Civil War.

Like the Army Choir’s performance, Lamar’s message seemed to sail over the heads of those with the most power to address the problems being spoken about. Yet for millions watching, the message landed with undeniable force. This is precisely how artistic resistance functions: hiding in plain sight, speaking truth regardless of whether those in power choose to hear it.

Musical resistance found particularly fertile ground in the American counterculture of the 1960s. Bob Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind” posed questions that still resonate: “How many years can some people exist before they’re allowed to be free?” Similarly, his “The Times They Are a-Changin’” served notice to the establishment that a new order was emerging, warning senators and congressmen: “Don’t stand in the doorway, don’t block up the hall.” His lyrics provided an intellectual framework for resistance while other artists of his time offered more direct calls to action.

Music’s power as resistance often depends on context. Consider “Edelweiss,” created for the 1959 Broadway musical and film adaptation of “The Sound of Music.” On the surface, it is a gentle folk song about a mountain flower. Yet within the narrative, it becomes a devastating statement of Austrian patriotism in the face of Nazi occupation. Honestly, I still tear up every time Captain Von Trapp chokes up during his performance and the audience joins in, transforming a simple melody into a communal act of defiance against fascism. The personal becomes political; the sentimental becomes subversive.

When direct speech becomes dangerous and therefore withers away, music often finds a way to fill the void. In the Soviet Union, Vladimir Vysotsky’s poetic ballads used metaphor and allegory to critique society while nominally complying with censorship. His voice conveyed truths that could not be spoken openly, creating emotional resonance for millions of citizens living under oppression.

This pattern of musical ingenuity has repeated worldwide. In Chile, during Augusto Pinochet’s brutal dictatorship, the Nueva Canción movement became the heartbeat of resistance. Artists like Victor Jara developed folk music that championed indigenous rights and social justice. Jara’s reward was torture and execution following Pinochet’s 1973 coup — his hands allegedly broken so he could no longer play guitar, a final act of cruelty that underscored exactly how threatening music can be to authoritarian regimes.

15 years after the coup, La Alegría Ya Viene – the Chilean opposition’s anthem in the 1988 referendum that would determine whether Pinochet’s rule would continue – was released. It stood in stark contrast to the militaristic, somber Himno del Sí that supported the dictator; the government was using what is supposedly a liberating form of expression to manipulate the public. La Alegría Ya Viene, with its melody that united millions, proved that a single song can topple a dictatorship.

Perhaps no Chilean song embodies resistance more powerfully than Los Prisioneros’ “El Baile de los que Sobran” (“The Dance of Those Left Behind”). Released in 1986 during Pinochet’s regime, the song critiqued educational inequality and social marginalisation with lines like “Why don’t they just tell us that this party was never meant for us?”

Forty years after its release, during Chile’s 2019-2020 social uprising, I watched through my phone screen from England as hundreds of thousands of protestors sang it in the streets of Santiago. Across generations and despite the passage of time, its message of exclusion and broken promises retained its power to unify and mobilise.

While music has proven its power as resistance, we must acknowledge its equally significant role as a tool of oppression. National anthems instil patriotic fervour that can be channelled into aggression against others. Military marches prepare soldiers psychologically for violence. Propaganda songs normalise authoritarian ideas by making them catchy and memorable.

The Nazi regime understood this duality perfectly, simultaneously banning “degenerate” music while promoting compositions that aligned with their ideology. Richard Wagner’s music, though created before Nazism, was co-opted by Hitler’s regime to promote Germanic supremacy. The music itself was not inherently oppressive, but its deployment served oppressive ends.

This points to a critical distinction: Art that controls typically demands conformity, while art that liberates invites questioning. Control-oriented art presents simple answers; liberating art poses difficult questions. The former closes possibilities; the latter opens them.

As we move further into 2025, with political tensions high and social divisions seemingly intractable, artistic resistance remains as vital as ever. The Army Choir’s performance at the White House and Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl statement stand in a lineage stretching back through countless other artists who used their work to speak truth to power.

The revolution may not be an apple that falls when ripe, as Guevara suggested, but perhaps it is a song that grows louder as more voices join. Whether it’s sung by an Army Choir in the White House, chanted by protesters in Santiago, or rapped during the most-watched television event of the year, the melody of resistance continues.

Those in power may not always hear it or may choose not to understand. But for those with ears to listen, the message remains clear: another world is possible, and the soundtrack is already playing.