WINCHESTER — There have been many (many) exhibitions devoted to America’s 250th birthday. Some are still out there. They’ve been variously celebratory, critical, ideological, archival, artistic, historical, didactic, you name it. It’s a big country, after all, and 250 years is a long time. Recognizing both that bigness and lengthiness, the best ones have offered a combination of all of the aforementioned approaches.
The Griffin Museum of Photography has been making its own contribution to the 250th with an ongoing series of exhibitions under the heading “State of Our Union.” It concludes with “American Musicality.“ Along with two smaller, related shows, ”In Concert: Photography and the Violin” and “William Feiring” — they, too, are about music — it’s presented under the rubric “Common Time.”
All three run through Dec. 6.
“American Musicality” is as fitting a 250th show as there’s been, this despite the fact it never once mentions the nation’s semiquincentennial. The title, which describes its subject, tells you why it’s so fitting.
Walt Whitman wrote a poem called “I Hear America Singing.” There are two ways to interpret that title. The more obvious one is quite literal: that what Whitman is hearing is America and its citizens, as he says, singing. The other interpretation is less overt but far more resonant: That it’s through singing, or music generally, that one most clearly finds that which is most American.
Nearly a century and a half of cultural history argues for the second interpretation. We hold these truths to be self-sounding: That America, at its best, combines democracy, equality, energy, innovation, impudence, excitement, you name it. They’re all there, audible and triumphant, in ragtime and jazz and country and R&B and rock and soul and rap and hip-hop. It’s hard to imagine something more American — more uniquely American — than that the artistry of anonymous poor Black people from the Deep South and anonymous poor white people from Appalachia should initiate something that would conquer global culture. Hearing America singing, the rest of the world made its songs a suite of global anthems.
“American Musicality” includes the work of eight photographers, totaling 123 photographs, as well as another dozen jazz images from the holdings of collector Gary Leopold. Among them are such classics as Aaron Siskind’s “Savoy Dancers” and William Gottlieb’s glorious 1948 view of a rapt, almost otherworldy Billie Holiday.
Four of the eight photographers are local: Henry Horenstein, Margo Cooper, Lou Jones, and Ron Pownall. It’s hard to pick a favorite among the 17 from Horenstein’s book “Honky Tonk.” Let’s go with “Lilly Brothers Reunion Show, Hillbilly Ranch, Boston, MA,” from 1978. It’s just as hard to choose one from the 21 offerings from Cooper’s “The Blues Is Heart and Soul.” How about “Bobby Rush and dancers, McComb, Mississippi,” from 1997?
(Rush faces the camera, arms thrust up in a triumphant V. This wonderfully chimes with Gloria Gaynor, back to the camera, arms similarly raised, in Michael Weinstein’s 1979 photograph of her in performance. Gaynor may or may not be singing her massive hit “I Will Survive.” But with that gesture she sure ought to be.)
Cooper includes a couple of jazz singers along with her blues artists: Abbey Lincoln and Betty Carter. Carter also appears in the dozen portraits from Jones’s “Jazz” series. He shows her holding up an Errol Garner LP: two jazz greats for the price of one.
Pownall is a rock ’n’ roll lifer. The earliest photo here from his “Full Access” series dates to 1968 (Jimi Hendrix). The most recent is 2018 (Macklemore). Local venues past and present include the Paradise, Worcester Centrum, Orpheum, Music Hall, and the old Garden. In 1974 alone, he was at the Garden to shoot Bob Dylan, Marvin Gaye, Crosby, Stills and Nash, and Stevie Wonder. I confess to being partial to that last one. I was there that night.
Bootsy Holler (now there is a name) chronicled the Seattle music scene of the ’90s and ’00s in her 2025 book “MAKiNG iT” (now there is a use of letter case). She has 14 photographs here. Eight are black-and-white, five are color, and one, of Moby, manages to be both.
Janette Beckman first made her reputation photographing punk and New Wave bands in her native England. She moved to New York in 1982 and switched her focus to the hip-hop scene. Her dozen photographs are full of energy and attitude — hers and the bands’ both.
All of these photographers focus on musicians. Joseph O. Holmes’s five photographs here are of a venue, that punk/New Wave fons et origo, CBGB. Holmes was there in 2006, just weeks before the club closed. He photographed in the morning and afternoon, with no one else around — so it really is the venue he’s documenting, not the scene. As one might expect, or even hope, the place looks like a complete dump — but as rendered by Holmes in long color exposures that dumpiness is fabulous.
“In Concert: Photography and the Violin” is just what it says: photographs with violins in them. The 38 pictures are a pleasing melange of styles and dates and purposes. Some of the violinists are famous (Jascha Heifetz, Fritz Kreisler, Jack Benny). Some of the photographers are famous (Weegee, August Sander, Robert Frank, Josef Koudelka). Many of the violinists and photographers are anonymous. The pictures come from the collection of Evan Mirapaul. You will not be surprised to learn he is a former violinist.
Musicians, venues, and instruments all matter in making music. So do listeners. The 16 photographs from William Feiring’s “Feel the Music” series show people listening to a particular piece. Each title consists of the listeners’ first name, along with the name of the performer and title of the piece being listened to.
Feiring shoots his subjects (most are couples, a few are individuals — think of them as duets and solos) in front of a nondescript grayish backdrop. This emphasizes the listeners’ faces. Seeing their responses is a reminder of one of the great paradoxes of music, for performer and listener both. It’s at once so inner, intimate, and personal, yet also so outer, expressive, and public. Seeing is believing? Sure. So’s hearing, though belief barely begins to describe what’s going on.
COMMON TIME
American Musicality
In Concert: Photography and the Violin
William Feiring
At Griffin Museum of Photography, 67 Shore Road, Winchester, through Dec. 6. 781-729-1158, griffinmuseum.org
Mark Feeney can be reached at mark.feeney@globe.com.