When country music star Lainey Wilson toured Europe this year, her sister wondered if fans would understand her song lyrics.

It didn’t matter. In Amsterdam, half the audience sang along in Dutch, while the other half sang in English.

“That’s the power of music and that’s the power of storytelling,” Wilson said at the June 24 launch of the U.S. Department of State-YouTube Global Music Partnership.

“It truly does transcend language barriers. What I have learned from traveling the world and playing music is we’re all actually a lot more alike than you think, and we have so much in common.”

Wilson is one of 11 new U.S. Global Music Ambassadors who will continue the department’s tradition of bringing people together through music. America’s Music Diplomacy dates to the 1950s  when Dizzy Gillespie and Louis Armstrong and other “Jazz Ambassadors” toured Europe, Africa and the Middle East, often performing for audiences who had never heard American music.

“All of us are here because we believe in the power of music,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Washington as he introduced Wilson and the other new music ambassadors.

Blinken said that music inspires us, but also has the power “to communicate and to connect.” The just-announced ambassadors represent genres from Rap and Country to Blues, Opera, Soul and Jazz.

The U.S. global music ambassadors are Wilson, Chuck D (pic), Grace Bowers, BRELAND, Kane Brown, Denyce Graves, Herbie Hancock, Jelly Roll, Teddy Swims, Justin Tranter and Armani White. In addition to performing around the world and offering a window into U.S. culture, the ambassadors will collaborate with local musicians and work with young people who can benefit from exposure to music.

Their diplomacy efforts will also work toward three goals:

  • Advancing English learning through music.
  • Creating music-education exchange programs.
  • Providing small grants to prepare young people for creative-sector jobs.

“This partnership is meant to empower and inspire,” said Lyor Cohen, global head of music at YouTube, a virtual stage spanning 100 countries and 80 languages. Pioneering rapper Chuck D, who was performing in Germany in November 1989 when the Berlin Wall came down, said touring the world has convinced him that music can “move things in many ways.”

He said that “culture and arts bring human beings together for our similarities and knocks the differences to the side.”