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AMNA NAWAZ: For some
five decades, artist and
musician Laurie Anderson

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has been redefining cultural
boundaries. In a new album,

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she's now exploring the
story of an earlier woman
who reached for the heights.

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Senior arts correspondent
Jeffrey Brown reports for our
arts and culture series, Canvas.

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JEFFREY BROWN: So this is
where a lot of stuff happens.

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LAURIE ANDERSON, Artist and
Musician: It happens. Some
of the stuff happens here.

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And this is most of the
audio world. So this is...

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JEFFREY BROWN: Laurie Anderson
in her downtown New York studio
altering the sound of her voice.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: This
is a standard vocoder.
If you sound different,

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you're a different
person. So this, you
can make more symphonic.

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JEFFREY BROWN: Creating
musical layers with
her electronic viola.

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For some 50 years,
she's been a pioneer of
storytelling, mixing music,

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art, theater and film, a
happily uncategorizable
artist of our time.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: There are
ways of making things that

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it doesn't matter what
the material is in a way.
If I'm playing a violin,
or if I'm painting, I'm

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using the same arm. I'm asking
myself the exact same questions.
Is it bright enough? Is it crazy

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enough? Is it sweet enough,
beautiful enough? Is it
complicated enough? Is
it communicating enough?

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JEFFREY BROWN: Now she's
turned her attention to
a fascinating pioneer of
another time and talent.

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WOMAN: Taking off, May 20.

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JEFFREY BROWN: Amelia
Earhart and her 1937
attempt to circle the globe,

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a flight that ended in
mystery and tragedy.

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AMELIA EARHART, Pilot: This
modern world of science and

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invention is of particular
interest to women.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: Anderson uses
Earhart's own voice, logs and
letters layered into narration

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and music to produce a 22-track
evocative mix of classical
and electronic strings,

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effects, sounds and percussion,
all of it composed and
performed by Anderson,

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joined by other singers and
an orchestra, to imagine her
way into Earhart's cockpit.

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WOMAN: The instruments quiver.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: So I tried
to imagine what it would
be like for a pilot to be

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in a little plane like
that with the motor
going like aah days and

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days. This is really
hot. There's no A.C. in
these little cockpits.

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She's like this. What
did that feel like?

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MAN: Amelia Earhart.

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JEFFREY BROWN: She also
loved and connected with

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Earhart's deep interest in the
latest technology of her time.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: She was not
white gloves at all. She was
down in the engine and seeing

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what's going on and working with
her mechanics and her designers.
And I really admire that.

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JEFFREY BROWN: That does
sound a little like you.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: I identified
with her, of course.

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JEFFREY BROWN: You did,
from the beginning?

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LAURIE ANDERSON: Yes, I
just -- there aren't many
models for women in this

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country who do stuff. I
just gravitated over to her.
She's a Midwesterner also,

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so -- like me. And so
I kind of thought, why
would she want to do that?

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JEFFREY BROWN: Anderson
has been known for asking
herself and us pointed,

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sometimes unexpected
questions, since her
1981 song "O Superman."

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(MUSIC)

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JEFFREY BROWN: A mix of
electronic music, words and
movement that became an unlikely

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pop hit. It was a breakthrough
into the larger culture after
years as an avant-garde artist.

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One of her early
signature pieces, "Duets
on Ice" for violin and
tape recorder performed

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on streets wearing skates frozen
into a block of ice. When the
ice melted, the music stopped,

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the ethos of the 1970s New
York art and music world she
was a big part of, experiment.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: We didn't know
what we were doing. We didn't.

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JEFFREY BROWN: Yes.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: But we
wanted to make things.
So we all had pickup

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trucks. We were all
like DIY people. I mean,

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we helped each other. This is
so key. We never thought we'd
make a living doing this stuff,

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music and dance and theater. We
just wanted to experiment, make
something that wasn't there.

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JEFFREY BROWN: But
somehow you did.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: And
it was exhilarating.

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JEFFREY BROWN: Over the
years, in addition to her
13 albums and performances
all over the world...

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WOMAN: I want to
tell you a story.

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JEFFREY BROWN: ... Anderson
has made films, like "Heart of
a Dog," written a multimedia

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performance based on Herman
Melville's "Moby-Dick,"
helped create the Opening

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Ceremony for the 2004 Athens
Olympics, and created solo
exhibits of her paintings and

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drawings, including The Weather,
shown at the Hirshhorn Museum
in Washington, D.C., in 2021.

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In 1992, she met
another downtown star,

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rock 'n' roll legend Lou
Reed. They worked together
for the next 21 years,

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marrying in 2008 before his
death in 2013. It was a loving
partnership that encompassed

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Buddhism and tai chi, as
well as music and, she
says, constant artistic
seeking and questioning.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: I talked
to Lou a lot about why would
-- why do anything and...

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JEFFREY BROWN: Why do anything?

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LAURIE ANDERSON: Why do
anything? JEFFREY BROWN: Yes.

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LAURIE ANDERSON: Why write this
song? Why do this show? Why
-- what do you here doing this

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for? And the answer really
is that you just look
for the brightest light
possible and go that way.

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We had many conversations
about what we were doing
as artists and why we

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were doing it. And it
was really about trying
to go there, to that.

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JEFFREY BROWN: Now 77,
Anderson is still going to
new places with technology,

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including the world of A.I.
She's working with a machine
learning institute in Australia,

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which has inputted everything
she and Reed wrote or
recorded into a supercomputer.

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And how does that sound?
How does that feel?

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LAURIE ANDERSON: This is
not like a Ouija board
and I'm talking to my
dead husband. Really,

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I'm not actually crazy. But
people have styles, and they
are real things. I mean,

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I'm not afraid of machines
taking over at all. I'm afraid
of people becoming machines,

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not even seeing things
for themselves or thinking
for themselves. That's
what I'm afraid of.

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JEFFREY BROWN: She's also become
something of a TikTok sensation,
as "O Superman" has been taken

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up and restyled by a new
generation, especially
her lines, "You don't
know me, but I know you."

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LAURIE ANDERSON: I was thrilled
because I want to be useful. I
want to have people use this for

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something. As I learn more and
more about what stories are, I
realize, this is a constant. The

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stories you tell yourself
about who you are and
what you want, those are
stories to help you live.

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If you don't have those
suddenly, it's terrifying. I
mean, you will keep living,

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you will keep eating, but it's
the story that keeps you going.

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JEFFREY BROWN: After
finishing work on Amelia,

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Laurie Anderson has turned
to an even more ambitious
work about nothing less

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than climate change and the
possible end or saving of the
world. She calls it "ARK."

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For the "PBS News Hour"...

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LAURIE ANDERSON: I'm
Jeffrey Brown with...

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JEFFREY BROWN: Laurie Anderson.