Springsteen to play free Philly set for Obama

The Boss will come to the Parkway on Saturday for a free performance in support of a man who would be president.

Bruce Springsteen will perform an acoustic set at an open-air rally for U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D., Ill.) from a stage near 20th and 22d Streets, the Obama campaign said yesterday.

The free program, for which tickets are required, begins at 3:30 p.m. and will include other performers and speakers, said Sean Smith, the campaign's Pennsylvania spokesman.

It was unclear yesterday whom those performers would be, but among those not scheduled to be at the rally are the candidate himself and his running mate, U.S. Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. of Delaware.

Springsteen's group, the E Street Band, won't be there, either. "He is coming by himself," Smith said.

Mayor Nutter's spokesman, Douglas Oliver, said it was unlikely that Nutter would return from business outside the city in time to make the rally. "But stranger things have happened," Oliver added.

With the Oct. 6 deadline for voters to register for the November election approaching, Smith said, the rally presents an opportunity for the Obama organization to recruit volunteers. "We expect to build the largest get-out-the-vote operation in Pennsylvania's history, and that's going to require a lot of volunteers to pull off," Smith said.

Although the rally is free, tickets are required. People who sign up to volunteer will get standing room near the stage, Smith said.

"If they don't want to do that, they can still go online and print out the ticket for general admission," Smith said. "It'll be cordoned off by police barriers."

Spokesmen for the Police Department and the Managing Director's Office said it was too early to say what security measures would be taken and who would pay for them.

Springsteen endorsed Obama in April, saying the Illinois senator "speaks to the America I've envisioned in my music for the past 35 years."

The rock star's political activism dates to 1979, when he headlined the No Nukes concerts at Madison Square Garden.

His songs of working-class struggle first found their way into the arena of presidential politics in 1984, when "Born in the U.S.A." turned him into a superstar.

That year, at a rally in Hammonton, N.J., President Ronald Reagan said, "America's future rests in a thousand dreams inside our hearts. It rests in the message of hope in the songs of a man so many young Americans admire: New Jersey's own Bruce Springsteen."

Springsteen, who wrote "Born in the U.S.A." about an unemployed Vietnam veteran, later said: "You see in the Reagan TV ads on TV, you know, 'It's morning in America,' and you say, 'Well, it's not morning in Pittsburgh.' "

But the Jersey rocker did not take sides in a presidential campaign until 2004, when he headlined the Vote for Change tour with other big-name acts, such as the Dixie Chicks and Pearl Jam, working for Sen. John Kerry.

Although Obama will not be here this weekend, he plans to attend a concert scheduled for Oct. 16 in New York City featuring Springsteen and Billy Joel. That concert, to be held in the Hammerstein Ballroom, will not be free, with tickets starting at $500 and going up to $10,000.