If you still think Sousa concert marches and EDM DJ performances live on separate musical universes : congratulations, tenure at some university or other surely awaits you.
But you would be wrong.
One can’t, for example, read eye witness accounts of actual Sousa concerts without feeling that the words “breakdown” and “drop” - heck even “risers” and “stings” et al, were originally invented to describe the effects the highly theatrical band leader always sought to give audiences throughout his long career.
Sousa made his living in three directly opposing ways.
(A) by selling sheet music of his original material - marches mostly - in watered down, straight and simple , versions for the home piano or the local small town marching band to perform, (B) making hundreds of low quality recording by the original limited acoustic method and (C) by delivering his own far superior arrangements of this somewhat bland starter material - live and in person - at a concert put on by his own highly trained band.
For as a composer, Sousa was merely ‘okay’ but as a dynamic and highly creative ‘arranger’, Sousa was simply one of the best ever. It is Sousa the arranger, not Sousa the composer, that I wish to emulate.
He and his musicians took pride in never writing down their special arranging techniques, memorizing them instead - to be delivered instantly whenever coach-conductor Sousa delivered the inside-football hand signals from the bandstand.
So to really enjoy the Sousa ‘brand’, you had to hear it from the one and only Sousa band and hear it live - the magic produced instantly before you and just as quickly disappearing.
Isn’t that exactly why people today still pay the big bucks to see the top DJs perform their magic live, even in this era of digital streaming ?
I think it only goes to show that while perhaps music changes - people - performers AND audiences - don’t....
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