Happy birthday, John Philip Sousa!

Today, we celebrate the 161st anniversary of John Philip Sousa's birth!

John Philip Sousa was a very famous American conductor and composer who is known as the March King since he wrote so many marches. One of his marches, "Stars and Stripes Forever," was voted by the United States Congress to be the official national march of the United States of America! He also led his own band, wrote 136 marches and 10 operas, wrote 3 novels and an autobiography, and conducted about 14,000 (yes, that's 14 thousand) concerts throughout his life!

I'll leave you with this video of The President's Own performing "Stars and Stripes Forever."

If you're interested in hearing more of John Philip Sousa's marches, do a YouTube search for him or check out the collections that The President's Own is compiling on their website. Click here to access videos, scores, and parts of 17 of his marches. Click on the one you'd like to hear, and it will bring you to a page for that piece. You can click to download the track (in mp3 format, if you want to put it on your phone/iPod/iPad/etc.), download the score and parts (see what the conductor sees or what the individual musicians see), or scroll down a little further to listen to it via embedded video. What's neat about the video is that they also have the score so you can try to follow along as the music plays! It's very small, though, even when you click the YouTube logo in the bottom right corner to be able to open it via YouTube and make it full screen. If you're struggling to read it, you can download the score separately. If you'd like me to listen to it with you so I can point out where we are in the music, I'd be more than happy to do so!


DRUM CARD OPPORTUNITY: Email me and tell me your favorite Sousa march other than "Stars and Stripes Forever." I don't expect you to listen to all 135 other ones, but you can tell me about one or two that you listened to. :)