Regular readers of this blog may recall that I ran into the tuba-playing son of a member of the Sousa Band on one of my recent theater-related journeys. He loaned me a copy of Marching Along, John Philip Sousa’s long-out-of-print 1928 autobiography, which I read and found (somewhat to my surprise) to be utterly fascinating.
I resolved at once to write a “Sightings” column about Sousa and his memoirs, and the fruits of that resolution will be published in tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal. It turns out that Sousa, who also wrote three full-length novels and 138 newspaper and magazine articles, was as vigorous and engaging a prose stylist as he was a composer, and Marching Along offers a vivid glimpse of his offstage personality.
To find out more about Sousa and Marching Along, pick up a copy of Saturday’s Journal and see what I have to say.
UPDATE: Read the whole thing here.
Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City
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