Springsteen exhibition coming to National Constitution Center

One nation under . . . Bruce?

The National Constitution Center would like to think so. The museum on Independence Mall, more used to Founding Fathers and government branches than rockers, announced Thursday it would be the only venue outside the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland to host a hugely popular Bruce Springsteen exhibition.

"From Asbury Park to the Promised Land: The Life and Music of Bruce Springsteen" will run at the center from Feb. 17 to Sept. 3, 2012.

"It explores one of our most treasured rights, freedom of expression," Constitution Center president and chief executive David Eisner said at a news conference Thursday morning, surrounded by guitars that belonged to, no, not Bruce, but to museum staff members.

(Actual Springsteen guitars, including the Fender Esquire featured on the cover of Born to Run, will be part of the exhibition, along with handwritten drafts of lyrics, tapes of his audition with Columbia Records, the iconic outfit he wore on the Born in the USA album cover, and Springsteen's 1960 Corvette.)

Tickets are available on the center's website, www.constitutioncenter.org. (An adult ticket is $24.50, including admission to the museum; children's tickets are $12.)

Eisner said Springsteen was, indeed, a natural fit for the museum, which he described as "about the values and dreams on which America was based."

Seeking to establish the center's Bruce bona fides, he noted that the announcement was made on the anniversary of the date Springsteen appeared on the covers of Time and Newsweek in 1975. (They may have over-prepared a bit with the Bruce karaoke-machine exhibit set up in the lobby in anticipation of fans showing up for the news conference. The fans didn't show, though it was amusing to see the lyric "It's a town for losers" scrolling on the big screen.)

So, is the Boss now considered one of the Founding Fathers?

"Bruce Springsteen has always pushed the boundaries of free speech, pushed the boundaries of artists and politics, and of music as a form of popular protest," said Eisner, who described himself as a huge Bruce fan.

"Springsteen gives voice to everyday Americans, the working class, immigrants, veterans. He shows in a deep way the struggle to attain the American dream and the distance we have to go to attain it."

The exhibition was created by the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and ran there for two years, drawing members of E Street nation from all over. Springsteen himself visited on one of the last days, unannounced.

Eisner said the center was always looking for ways to draw in new audiences (see: Lady Diana's wedding dress). From a business standpoint, he said, the exhibition hit the museum's "sweet spot." Eisner said the center is operating in the black and has a $45 million endowment.

A group of center employees visited the Cleveland exhibition on their own, he said, and came away impressed with how much of it was "about America." A year of negotiations later, with the Hall of Fame and with Springsteen's people, and the deal was struck.

The exhibition is a coup for the center and for Philadelphia, home to a huge fan base of the New Jersey icon. Eisner said that he "has no expectations" about whether Springsteen will visit the 5,000-square-foot exhibition, which also includes family photos and the saxophone used by the late Clarence Clemons to play his soaring solo on "Jungleland," but that Springsteen and his people had approved the exhibition's move to Philadelphia. "They approve everything," he said. (It remains to be seen whether the exhibition inspires Gov. Christie, a huge Springsteen fanboy, to cross the river to the Philly side.)

"It's the right city for Bruce," said Jason Fehon, a producer and announcer for WMMR, one of the first radio stations to play Springsteen back in the '70s. "Philly has always been a home away from home for Bruce. He loves the city. We love him back."

Still, a Springsteen exhibition in a museum dedicated to the Constitution seemed a bit of a stretch to some visitors Thursday. Any idea under which branch - judicial, executive, legislative - to file the Boss?

"I wonder what that has to do with the Constitution," said Derri Benbow, a teacher at the Center School in Abington. "He is kind of the American dream, I guess."

If nothing else, the exhibition may serve to introduce the area's field-tripping middle school students to a rock legend of whom many are only vaguely aware.

Outside the room with the statues of the Founding Fathers, within earshot of that Springsteen karaoke machine pumping out its Bruce-less version of "Thunder Road," Kathryn Riter, 14, took her best guess.

"Is he a singer?"