EXPLORE the soundtrack of our American life.
Sounds Like America is a place to explore the vibrant, kaleidoscopic, and beautiful music that reflects all the complexities and contradictions of this place and its people.
To trace the roots and routes of our American journeys through our songs, and to find the crossroads where traditions merge and new hybrids grow.
To listen to the echoes of the past as they become the whispers of the future.
In this evolving series of conversations-with-music, pianist, curator, and NPR host Lara Downes sits down with a rotating cohort of leading voices across scholarship, literature, journalism, and the arts for live conversations that explore the cultural forces shaping collective identity. Each program centers on a piece of music as a point of entry into larger questions of history, belonging, creativity, resilience, and change.
A format initially created for NPR's "All Things Considered" to examine the origin story of the nation, the series continues conversations with John McWhorter, Eddie Glaude, Adam Gopnik, Imani Perry, Salamishah Tillet, Nate Chinen and other leading visionaries —each bringing a distinct lens to conversations that connect iconic music with the ideas that shape our experiences.
Through the course of each evening, Downes and each collaborator illuminate a unique perspective of the ways sound reflects the ethos of its time—its contradictions and continuities, its struggles and aspirations—while opening space for dialogue about where we are now and where we might be headed.
Designed for audiences seeking meaningful cultural engagement, this series creates a shared space for listening, reflection, and connection—where music becomes both mirror and meeting ground.
Lara’s Substack platform houses her insights into American music, tracing the roots and routes of our journeys through our music, finding crossroads where traditions merge and the echoes of the past become whispers of the future. You’ll find:
Thoughts and Reflections: exploring the sonic DNA that connects today’s music to the sounds of the past.
Listening Sessions: from single tracks to full albums, curating treasures from the archives, new releases, and basement tapes.
Conversations: talking with the artists and innovators defining the music of today and tomorrow.
Postcards from the Road: sending field notes, audio dispatches and snapshots from my musical travels across the country.
Up next:
SOUNDS LIKE AMERICA with special guest Rhiannon Giddens at the Rowan University Marie Radar series, Glassboro NJ, October 30, 2026
What’s the defining sound of American classical music? What people, stories, sights and sounds throughout American history built our unique classical tradition, and where does it go from here? On Classical Americana, visionary pianist Lara Downes drives you down the highways and byways of American music, with roadside discoveries and detours to the crossroads where musical traditions merge and transform.
Tune in each Saturday 6PM-7PM.
