This document discusses John Philip Sousa's march "The Stars and Stripes Forever" and how its identity has changed over the 20th century. Originally composed in 1897, Sousa intended it to stir feelings of American patriotism through its orchestration and lyrics. The piece became enormously popular when performed by Sousa's band. In the early 20th century, it came to represent American national pride and unity. However, as the piece was performed in new historical contexts over the century, its meaning transformed and the intense patriotic feelings Sousa envisioned became less prominent.

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The Stars and Stripes Forever?
The Song’s Changing Identity Throughout the 20th Century
By: Lauren Extrom
American Studies and Music
Boston University College of Arts and Sciences
Class of 2016
Senior Honors Thesis

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Abstract
In this thesis, I will discuss John Philip Sousa’s The Stars and Stripes Forever,
with a focus on the composer’s musical career and how this piece, as many of his other
marches, had a significant impact on his audiences’ feelings of American pride. I will
then place the piece in a larger context in the 20th century, and demonstrate how it has
evolved in terms of who has played it, where it has been played, and what was the
significance of the performance context. In many cases, it will appear that the intended
strong feelings of American pride that Sousa had in mind when writing the original piece
do not exist at the same level. The meaning of this important piece of American music
has been transformed by its historical context.

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Introduction
While vacationing with his wife in Europe, John Philip Sousa—also known as the
“March King”—learned that the Sousa Band’s manager, David Blakely, had suddenly
passed away. He was eager to go home so he could take over the business matters of his
band. Sousa later recorded the thoughts that circled his mind while he was on a ship back
to the U.S.:1
Here came one of the most vivid incidents of my career. As the vessel (the Teutonic)
steamed out of the harbor I was pacing on the deck, absorbed in thoughts of my
manager's death and the many duties and decisions which awaited me in New York.
Suddenly, I began to sense a rhythmic beat of a band playing within my brain.
Throughout the whole tense voyage, that imaginary band continued to unfold the same
themes, echoing and re-echoing the most distinct melody. I did not transfer a note of that
music to paper while I was on the steamer, but when we reached shore, I set down the
measures that my brain-band had been playing for me, and not a note of it has ever
changed.2
This “vivid incident” would be the start of a phenomenon that traveled around the
country—through small towns and cities, by word-of-mouth, by recordings on the
gramophone and later on radio and television. The Stars and Stripes Forever, written by
Sousa in 1897, became the national march of America—in law (in 19873) and in heart.
As Paul Bierley, a renowned biographer of Sousa, explains, “It is particularly significant
that The Stars and Stripes Forever probably has been recorded more often than any other
1 John Philip Sousa, Revised Edition Marching Along, ed. Paul E. Bierley (Westerville, Ohio: Integrity
Press, 1994). 157.
2 Ibid.
3 Paul E. Bierley. The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa: Music in American Life. (Urbana: University
of Illinois Press,2006), 5.

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piece of music ever written.”4 The Sousa Band played The Stars and Stripes Forever at
almost every single concert in which they performed.
Figure 1. Cover page for the original score of The Stars and Stripes Forever, found on the
Library of Congress website.
4 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 79.

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Period 1-Sousa’s original, intended identity for “The Stars and Stripes Forever”
One might ask what made this piece in particular so popular. The original
orchestration calls for piccolo, oboe, bassoon, clarinet, trumpet, and trombone, among
other typical brass band instruments. One of the most important elements, however, is
the percussion, as it made this type of music vastly different from that of symphonic
composers. That is not to say that there are no percussive instruments in symphonic
music instrumentation; rather, the role of the percussion instruments is quite different.
For example, in the The Stars and Stripes Forever, the bass drums may symbolize—or,
sonorize— the sounds of guns firing at war, while the piccolo reminds the listener of a
hopeful voice in the midst of war, that is still heard among the clashing of the cymbals,
and even bursts into great solo song riffs and faster rhythm near the end. The layering of
the piece, too, is much more uniform than in other types of music at the time; this is due
in part because Sousa wrote his music vertically, changing the clefs line by line.5 The
different voice parts in his music also seem to push the melody forward at a constant rate;
there are not many pauses, and the climax of the piece seems to come at the end, just as
Sousa had done in most of his compositions.
5 Paul E. Bierley, John Philip Sousa,American Phenomenon. Rev. ed. Columbus, Ohio: Integrity Press,
1986, 125.

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Figure 2. Drum score of The Stars and Stripes Forever.
Sousa’s orchestration techniques, therefore, were not uninformed. His
determination to provide original, nonstandard works played a large role in how his
pieces ultimately turned out. The process by which Sousa composed a march was never
quite understood, even by Sousa himself:
If I want to write a march, [Sousa once said], I turn my imagination loose among scenes
of barbaric splendor. I picture to myself the glitter of guns and swords, the tread of feet
to the drumbeat, and all that is grand and glorious in military scenes. How these
compositions come, I cannot tell. It is an utter mystery to me”. 6
Thus, Sousa’s feeling of wanting to return home to the United States after an eventful trip
in Europe—even to deal with the death of Dave Blakely—a country that, at the time,
proudly supported the “glitter of guns and swords,” strongly influenced his orchestration
decisions in The Stars and Stripes Forever.
6 Ibid, 123.

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Sousa also wrote lyrics to The Stars and Stripes Forever, which further bring out
this sense of patriotism for his country, and thus provide opportunity for further historical
context.
Let martial note in triumph float
And liberty extend its mighty hand
A flag appears ‘mid thunderous cheers,
The banner of the Western land.
The emblem of the brave and true
Its folds protect no tyrant crew;
The red and white and starry blue
Is freedom’s shield and hope.
Other nations may deem their flags the best
And cheer them with fervid elation
But the flag of the North and South and West
Is the flag of flags, the flag of Freedom’s nation.
Hurrah for the flag of the free!
May it wave as our standard forever,
The gem of the land and the sea,
The banner of the right.
Let despots remember the day
When our fathers with mighty endeavor
Proclaimed as they marched to the fray
That by their might and by their right
It waves forever.
Let eagle shriek from lofty peak
The never-ending watchword of our land;
Let summer breeze waft through the trees
The echo of the chorus grand.
Sing out for liberty and light,
Sing out for freedom and the right.
Sing out for Union and its might,
O patriotic sons.
Other nations may deem their flags the best
And cheer them with fervid elation,
But the flag of the North and South and West
Is the flag of flags, the flag of Freedom’s nation.
Hurrah for the flag of the free.
May it wave as our standard forever
The gem of the land and the sea,
The banner of the right.

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Let despots remember the day
When our fathers with might endeavor
Proclaimed as they marched to the fray,
That by their might and by their right
It waves forever.7
Some of the key words and phrases that stand out—“Union”, “the flag of the North the
South and the West”, “and liberty extend its mighty hand”—emphasize Sousa’s
sentiments of patriotism to his country, but also heavily draw on imagery of how all
Americans, no matter from the North or South or West, can come together and celebrate
being Americans, despite times of war and recovering issues in the aftermath of the Civil
War.
Sousa believed that marches “should basically appeal to the fighting instincts in
man, that they should stir his patriotic impulses.”8 He also had specific technical
standards for his march music. The most important element was simplicity, “exemplified
by a solid, steady rhythm”9 and an easy-to-follow harmonic structure and counterpoint.10
Sousa considered marches to be “short masterpieces,” and that “a composer should take
the composition of a march as seriously as the composition of a symphony.11
This idea of moving forward—or, “marching along”—continuously throughout
his music was something Sousa must have considered characteristic of his identity as a
composer, especially since he entitled his autobiography, Marching Along. He also
embodied this idea of “marching along” in the organization of the sections of his
marches: there is no recapitulation of earlier moments as well as no return to the original
7 Sousa, Revised Edition Marching Along,ed. Paul E. Bierley (Westerville, Ohio: Integrity Press, 1994).
157-158.
8 Bierley, John Philip Sousa,American Phenomenon. Rev. ed. Columbus, Ohio: Integrity Press,1986, 123.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid.
11 Ibid.

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key of the piece or a traditional coda.12 He even made it clear that his piece was about to
end by placing the climax at the end. In performances, he even asked the horn players to
come to the front of the stage, to honor this distinction.13
Many of these orchestral techniques—along with Sousa’s inspiration and desire to
create truly original works—are present in The Stars and Stripes Forever.
The Sousa Band performed The Stars and Stripes 135 times between 1898 until
1930 in a series of “regular-length concerts” (two daily concerts with intermissions)
usually in concert halls in the U.S., but also even as far as New Zealand, England, and
Tasmania.14 The Band also played at Willow Grove Park in Pennsylvania every summer
from 1901 to 1926 (except in 1911) as the musical attraction of the amusement park
located there. This indicates one of the ways in which the character of march music
differs from that of classical music. This music was made to bring people together in
these small towns. This, when a carnival came to town, it was expected that march music
would be performed at the carnival. Town mayors would cancel school when the Sousa
Band came to town.15 In total, it is assumed that the Band played The Stars and Stripes
16 times during that period of summer concerts, many of them as encores; not all concert
programs have been successfully reconstructed, however, so it is quite possible that there
may have been even more performances of this piece at Willow Grove Park.16 Overall,
the number of times the Sousa Band performed this piece, nationally and internationally
and for a variety of crowds, suggests how much people enjoyed listening to the Band play
this piece, and how much the Band itself enjoyed performing it.
12
Ibid.
13 Ibid, 124.
14 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 270-309.
15 Ibid, 4
16 Ibid, 310.

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John Philip Sousa did not begin his career as a band conductor of mostly march
music, however. Born in Washington, D.C. on November 6, 1854 to a father of
Portuguese-Spanish descent and a mother of German descent, he had a general education
supplemented with a study of music at the Esputa Conservatory of Music. He also had his
own dance band, and he became an apprentice musician in the United States Marine
Band when he was just thirteen years old. However, most influential to his foundation as
a musician were his studies with George Felix Benkert, a renowned violinist, pianist, and
conductor. Benkert trained Sousa in the “European classical tradition,” yet he also
encouraged him to consider pursuing his own musical style. By age twenty, Sousa left
the Marine Band and served as a violinist and a conductor for many theater orchestras, in
Washington, D.C. and on tour. As he gained popularity, Sousa attracted the attention of
Marine Corps officials who eventually asked him to serve as the leader of the
“President’s Own,” the U.S. Marine Band; he did so for twelve years—from 1880 until
1892—until he decided to form the legendary Sousa Band.17
Sousa’s background in classical music paired with his desire to create the most
beautiful, clean-cut sounds of a band—without the help of string instruments—garnered
respect from many music critics and composers. As a perfectionist, he strove to make his
band “the world’s finest,” as many critics confirmed following the Band’s first tour in
Europe. Sousa recognized that, in the eyes of Europeans, America was a country
“lacking in cultural refinement,” and that most all of the world’s most famous composers
were European, while American composers often were not acknowledged by the rest of
the world. Part of this issue came from a lack of knowledge in the field of classical
17 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 2.

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music on the part of Americans, but Sousa worked to educate the public on the matter by
virtue of his Band’s performance style. The high expectations for his Band, especially
when playing classical pieces, encouraged other musical organizations in the U.S. to raise
their own potentials. Also, the fact that Sousa took his band to Europe on tour and
demonstrated this high level of precision in performance, proved to the rest of the world
that America could produce “quality music,” even without government funding for arts
programs, as was often the case in Europe.18 As a result, Sousa crafted a reputation as
being someone who—according to a Midwestern writer of an article in the Daily Argus
Leader (1925)—, “‘has…done as much or more for music in America and for American
music than any other person in the United States.’”19
Figure 3. The Sousa Band on their Paris Exposition in 1900, the first time they played
The Stars and Stripes internationally.
18 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 2-3.
19 Ibid, 3.

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Sousa’s passion to create a highly respected genre of American music was
representative of American national pride at the time. As Bierley explains,
Sousa came along at the right moment in history, when America was emerging as a world
power. The energy of his country is clear in his music, particularly the marches, which
people welcomed with great enthusiasm. March music was very popular, and to a certain
extent Sousa’s mirrored the pulse of the nation.20
America’s new role as a world power was not the only contributing factor to this sense of
national pride. During the time of the Sousa Band’s highest level of fame, America
started war with Spain. As in most all times of war, American patriotism created a
stronger sense of unity and strength against political enemies, and Sousa’s march music
was a successful and quite accessible medium for creating that national spirit.21
The Sousa Band’s mere presence, whether in the concert hall or in a small town at
an amusement park, made audiences feel a strong sense of American pride. The Band
was a musical ambassador for the nation, and a symbol for the greatness that America
was and could become. Paul Bierley describes a specific concert by the Sousa Band that
took place on April 10, 1898 at the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City, around
the time America was about to enter war with Spain. In his description, he emphasizes
how emotional Sousa’s audiences became when listening to his Band play, and how
involved they were in the outcome of the performance:
Five thousand people are present. They fill every seat, and hundreds more stand in the
rear…The program is well received by the huge audience. A medley of patriotic songs,
including “Yankee Doodle” and “Marching through Georgia,” builds enthusiasm, and
people begin to beat time with their feet. Selections from “El Capitan” are played next,
and then Sousa’s new march “The Stars and Stripes Forever” brings thunderous
applause…All around the hall, people wave handkerchiefs, hats, canes, and other articles.
The outburst is deafening…After the last note [from “Dixie”] is played[,] a man in a gray
suit yells, “Three cheers for the stars and stripes! For the North and South! We’re all
20 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 2.
21 Ibid, 1.

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ready!” … “Who says we’re not ready for war?”…Sousa’s rousing “Unchain the Dogs of
War”…draws more cheers, and band and chorus are obliged to repeat it several times
before five thousand hoarse and tired individuals make their ways home.22
Bierley, in another one of his biographies of Sousa, also depicts a moment in one of
Sousa’s concerts in which the audience responds to his playing of The Stars and Stripes
itself.
On the opening bar the electric light flag above the band, with its brilliant red, white, and
blue bulbs, is turned on. The audience rises. Our spines tingle and we see misty eyes all
around us. We are proud to be Americans. The man who is bringing us this stirring
march has expressed his patriotic feelings—and ours—as no other ever has.23
The fact that this music had the potential to draw out these types of emotions from a
crowd, some that even united attendees from the North and South, shows just how
influential the Sousa Band and Sousa’s music was on creating a nation of patriotic
people. The number of encores demanded by Sousa’s fans, too, suggests the role the
audience played in the overall progression of the performances.
However, Sousa’s music and band tours came at approximately the same time as
recording technology began to transform the music industry, creating a new medium for
Sousa to propagate his music and his love for his country. The first recording of The
Stars and Stripes was in 1897 by the Berliner Gramophone Company24 and was
performed by, unsurprisingly, the Sousa Band. However, Sousa strongly disliked the
22 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 1.
23 Paul E. Bierley, John Philip Sousa, American Phenomenon.Rev. ed. Columbus, Ohio: Integrity Press,
1986.
24 Sousa, John Philip, Henry Higgins, and Sousa Band. Stars and Stripes Forever. [E. Berliner's
Gramophone, United States,189-, monographic] Audio. Retrieved from the Library of Congress.

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involvement of technology with music; so much so, that he even wrote an essay outlining
his sentiments about the negative impact of technology on the “soul” of music creation:25
I foresee a marked deterioration in American music and musical taste, an interruption in
the musical development of the country, and a host of other injuries to music in its artistic
manifestations, by virtue—or rather by vice—of the multiplication of the various music
reproducing machines.26
Sousa believed that technology—specifically, music-recording devices—would
ultimately take away the need for practice and precision in the musical art form, and that
the effects would be detrimental to the entire nation, even in terms of the job market and
the voice of the American people. With the easy accessibility of “mechanical music” in
the home, “[t]he child becomes indifferent to practice, for when music can be heard in the
homes without the labor of study and close application…the amateur disappears entirely,
and with him a host of vocal and instrumental teachers, who will be without field or
calling.”27 He continues to explain, “singing will no longer be a fine
accomplishment…Then what of the national throat? Will it not weaken? What of the
national chest? Will it not shrink?”28 To make matters worse, the recording process, since
this technology was only just beginning to develop, was a very long and difficult one.
The sound quality of gramophones and phonographs, too, diminished the highly praised
character of pieces such as The Stars and Stripes, which only further diminished Sousa’s
regard for the combination of music and technology.
Even though Sousa opposed the idea of recording music, many recordings were
made of The Stars and Stripes Forever, not all featuring typical brass band arrangements.
25 John Philip Sousa, “Machine Songs IV: The Menace of Mechanical Music”. Computer Music Journal 17
(1). (1993): 14–18.
26 Sousa,“Machine Songs IV,” 14.
27 Ibid,15.
28 Ibid.

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Paul E. Bierley has documented all known commercial phonograph singles (as opposed
to full albums) recordings that the Sousa Band recorded, of which there are 1,770. Not
all of these songs were The Stars and Stripes Forever, but this song was recorded a
significant number of times. Below is a chart of when (approximately) and what
recording company recorded The Stars and Stripes Forever.
1895-1900 Two times by the Chicago Talking Machine Co. Exact dates unknown.
1897 Six times: four times by Berliner Gramophone Co. in New York, twice by
Columbia Phonograph Co. in Washington, D.C.
1898 Once by Berliner in New York.
Ca. 1898 Once by the United States Phonograph Company of Newark, New Jersey
in New Jersey.
1899 Two times: once in New York, another time in New York, Philadelphia,
or Washington D.C. (exact location unknown). Both by Berliner.
1900 Two times: once by Victor Talking Machine Co., another time by
Berliner. Both in Philadelphia.
1901 Four times by Victor in Philadelphia.
1902 Once by Victor in Philadelphia.
1903 Four times by Victor in Philadelphia.
1904 Three times by Victor in Philadelphia.
1905 Once by Victor in Philadelphia.
1906 Once by Victor in Camden.
1908 Six times by Victor in Camden.
1909 Two times by National Phonograph Company in New York.
1912 Once by Victor in Camden.
1926 Once by Victor in Camden.
Table 1: Discography of The Stars and Stripes Forever, played by the Sousa Band.29
29 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 428-456.

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The data in the table above shows a gap in recording sessions from 1912 until 1926. This
lack of recording sessions is due to a variety of factors. During this time period, many
band members joined the forces in WWI.30 In addition, Sousa also suffered from a
serious ear infection, which made the band inactive for nine months.31 The band also
went on a large number of tours during this time period.32 Sousa also had a “crippling
accident” in 1921 while riding a horse at Willow Grove; he ultimately suffered from
cracked vertebrae in his neck.33 Nevertheless, he returned to work as the Band’s leader
two months later.34
The Stars and Stripes Forever embodied much of the “national throat” during the
early 20th century: rejuvenation from a reunited North and South following the Civil War;
feelings of power and strength from war successes and economic gain; and advancements
in technology, which further heightened these patriotic shouts of this “national throat.”
Though this song was originally intended to exhibit a specific type of patriotism, it
eventually began to take on other identities, ones that accurately represented U.S.
government initiatives and ones that perhaps questioned or even opposed the
government’s initiatives. My research below suggests further adapted identities of The
Stars and Stripes Forever.
30 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 31.
31 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 31.
32 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 31-33.
33 Bierley, The Incredible Band of Sousa, 33.
34 Ibid.

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Period 2-“The Stars and Stripes” on Ukulele: Changes in American and Hawaiian
Musical Identity
The American way of life changed at an exponential rate following the Industrial
Revolution in the mid-19th century. Cultural, political, and economic transformations
changed the way that Americans thought about lifestyle and identity. In my view,
American music, though its definition covered a variety of musical genres and cultures
present in the U.S., still carried a sense of national pride in its name during these changes.
For scholars who wanted to find America’s equivalent of European classical music,
Sousa’s march music served as a valued genre of American patriotic music. Thus, with
its popularity in small towns and concert halls across the nation, The Stars and Stripes
Forever became the quintessential song of American patriotism. It represented freedom
and equal opportunity, two ideas which drew many foreigners to immigrate to the U.S.
during the early 20th century. Thus, it is not surprising that this ideal of American
patriotism spread to developing territories such as the Hawaiian Islands during WWII. A
country embodying a great level of patriotism in its “national throat,”—via patriotic
music such as The Stars and Stripes Forever— the U.S. influenced the music and culture
of the Hawaiian Islands. In this process, the islanders understood pieces such as The
Stars and Stripes Forever in their own cultural context, using it as a way to establish
individuality in a time when cultural identity, more-or-less, defined one’s place in the
world, especially in regard to the large variety of cultures in the U.S.
This process also had a reverse outcome, in which Americans embraced Hawaiian
culture—or, at least, they way in which Hawaiian culture was advertised. During the
post-WWII era, tourism in Hawaii soared, with many of those tourists from the U.S.,

18. Extrom 18
looking for a paradise get-away. John Connell and Chris Gibson, authors of “'No
Passport Necessary': Music, Record Covers and Vicarious Tourism in Post-War Hawai'i”
in The Journal of Pacific History explain the increase in the popularity and influence of
the record industry in Hawaii, as well as the U.S. during the 1940s, and how the evolution
of album cover art reflects the changing identity of Hawaii over time. 35 As more and
more people bought albums from Hawaii, the state’s national exposure grew immensely.
The combination of branding Hawaii as a tropical escape for Americans (via album cover
art that reflected tropical sceneries) along with Hawaii’s induction as one of the fifty
states further increased tourism rates. As a result, these tourists also brought American
culture, and music, with them, which many islanders openly embraced. Antonio Abreu
Santos (nicknamed “Batata” or “Potato”), an amateur ukulele player, was the first known
to have played The Stars and Stripes Forever on ukulele in 1910 at the Honolulu YMCA,
along with his rendition of Under the Double Eagle, another march by Sousa.36 Many
other ukulele virtuosos in Hawaii tested out this patriotic tune, the more famous being
Jessie Kalima of The Kalima Brothers and Bill Tapia, a Honolulu native who started
playing ukulele at the age of ten37. Jim Tranquada and John King, co-authors of Ukulele:
A History, explain how Jessie Kalima himself exemplified the overarching influence of
the patriotism and sense of identity that Sousa’s pieces invoked.
Consider, for example, the century-old tradition of playing Sousa marches on the
‘ukulele, a practice popularized by Jesse Kalima, who once confided to a Chicago
newspaper reporter his ambition to be the best ‘ukulele player in the world. On the most
35 John Connell and Chris Gibson, “ ‘No Passport Necessary’: Music, Record Covers and Vicarious
Tourism in Post-war Hawai’i”. The Journal of Pacific History 43 (1). Journal of Pacific History Inc.,
Taylor and Francis, Ltd.] (2008): 53.
36 Tranquada, Jim, and King, John. ‘Ukulele : A History. Honolulu, HI, USA: University of Hawaii Press,
2012. Accessed April 4, 2016. ProQuest ebrary, 61.
37 Ukulele.org, “Bill Tapia.” 2012. Accessed April 5, 2016.

19. Extrom 19
basic level, this is an expression of the continuing tradition of adapting a challenging
repertoire to demonstrate the ‘ukulele’s musical legitimacy. Yet this also is an instance of
a Native Hawaiian artist performing music that epitomized U.S. imperial ambitions that
led to the loss of Hawaiian sovereignty…38
The song still follows the basic melody originally set by Sousa. However, since the piece
came from an intention for an entire concert band to play it, and was turned into a piece
for solo/ensemble ukulele performance by Hawaiian musicians, the sound most certainly
lost some of its original patriotic intention, whether it was intentional in its recreation or
not.39 Just by comparing the piccolo score with the ukulele tab for The Stars and Stripes
Forever (see below), it is evident that much of the timbre of the piece is changed by
removal of this instrument.
38 Ibid, 2.
39 The Kalima Brothers, “The Stars and Stripes Forever.”

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Figure 4. Ukulele tab for The Stars and Stripes Forever. Referenced on a website called,
“Ukulelia: ‘[The] Stars and Stripes Forever.’”

21. Extrom 21
Figure 5. Original score for the piccolo. Found on the Library of Congress website.
In addition, many other songs produced in Hawaii by Hawaiian musicians
gradually showed more influences of American pop culture. Just by listening to others
songs by The Kalima Brothers, one can hear the bass line typical in a jazz or 1950s Rock
n’ roll song, and even vocal inflections similar to those of Elvis Presley. As Connell and
Gibson explain,
From at least the early 19th century, following the arrival of missionaries,
Hawaiian music and dance have ‘been subjected to persistent and deliberate non-
Hawaiian influences’...Modern instruments were introduced so that what is now a
‘typically Hawaiian string ensemble’ includes guitar, ukulele and steel guitar…
The three forms of Hawaiian music considered traditional…further evolved in the
20th century through tourism’s influence: ‘Each was shaped by the Hawaiian
musical community in response to the changing tastes of the U.S. mainland
market.’40
40 John Connell and Chris Gibson, “‘No Passport Necessary’”: 54.

22. Extrom 22
Thus, the influence of American music on Hawaiian traditional music—specifically, the
presence of The Stars and Stripes Forever in the minds of Hawaiian musicians—says
something about the changing identity of American music during this time period. The
fact that Hawaii—an island that evolved from a popular tourist destination for Americans
to one of the fifty states—embraced American culture and showed this influence in its
music, suggests that songs such as The Stars and Stripes Forever served as a type of U.S.
cultural diplomacy for American patriotism of the time. As a result of tourism and thus
the spread of American music and culture, Hawaii—as a vulnerable island-state—took on
a level of American identity, and musicians such as Jessie Kalima manifested this identity
in his cover of The Stars and Stripes Forever. The song, when placed in the context of a
hybrid of American and Hawaiian culture, changes in meaning. The song’s theme of
patriotism, too, though originally directed to Sousa’s idea of American culture, may now
express a theme of patriotism to a new America: one that has a naval base at Pearl Harbor
on one of the Hawaiian islands; one that includes Hawaii as a tourist destination, and later
as a state.
Period 3: The Change in Lyrics of “The Stars and Stripes” and Entry into the Country
Music Scene
As noted, the lyrics of The Stars and Stripes Forever evoke the same feelings of
American pride as in the musical content itself: Sousa uses imagery and diction to convey
America’s strength and resilience, in times of war and peace, in the past and in the
present. Yet, looking at the text also provides insight into how Sousa himself saw
America at the time. Sousa saw America as the greatest country in the world, because it
supports the ideas of freedom and equality, and that freedom will last “forever”.

23. Extrom 23
However, in 1955, a comedic country-singing duo, Homer and Jethro41, did a parody
on the original lyrics. In their performances, Homer (Henry D. Haynes) played the
guitar and Jethro (Kenneth C. Burns) played the mandolin, and they both sang popular
country/pop songs together, usually re-writing the lyrics to make the songs humorous.
This specific parody completely takes the piece out of the original musical context that
Sousa intended.42 The chorus reads as follows:
Be kind to your web-footed friends
For a duck may be somebody’s mother
Be kind to the denizen of the swamp
He’s a dilly through and through.
You may think that this is the end.
Well it isn’t ‘cause there is another chorus.43
The parody certainly suggests some form of mockery of Sousa and/or the U.S., since at
that time, The Stars and Stripes Forever was still a well-known patriotic piece.
The use of these specific instruments, too, places the piece in a different musical
context. In this performance setting, The Stars and Stripes Forever becomes a country
song, no longer played with instruments of a brass band, with large drums to create the
effect of the firing of canons. Instead, it is now played with instruments common in the
country and pop genres, with the melodies and harmonies only to be carried out on just
two instruments. Thus, the pride that Sousa felt for his country when writing this piece
has, in a sense, been taken away, and the identity of the piece itself has changed: it is now
a song for entertainment and jokes, not as a form of cultural diplomacy and inspiration
for the rest of America.
41 Encyclopædia Britannica Online,s.v. "Homer and Jethro", accessed April 05, 2016,
http://www.britannica.com/biography/Homer-and-Jethro.
42 Homer and Jethro, “Crazy Mixed Up Song,” 1955.
43 Ibid.

24. Extrom 24
The exposure of The Stars and Stripes Forever to the genre of American country
music also encouraged many country musicians to perform the piece on instruments such
as guitar or banjo, with the use of finger picking. During the 1970s, a time of major
displays of counterculture in the arts industry in protest of the Vietnam War, many
musicians performed The Stars and Stripes Forever to peacefully protest. Phil Ochs, a
singer/songwriter/protestor against the Vietnam War, references a few of Sousa’s lyrics is
his arrangement of “The War is Over.”44 James E. Perone, author of Music of the
Counterculture Era, explains how “the lyrics proclaim the end of war and the glory of
piece…Fragments from such patriotic compositions as John Philip Sousa’s The Stars and
Stripes Forever are woven into the texture, the implication being that peace can be
patriotic.”45 Again, Ochs’ reference to the piece primarily highlights that it was still
considered a piece of patriotic music at this time. However, it also suggests that Ochs
believed that peace, rather than war, was patriotic. In this case, the entire intent of the
reference to The Stars and Stripes Forever—more specifically, its lyrics—was to protest
war, something that Sousa wholly supported and praised in his music, and to instead
promote peace as being an act of patriotism. I believe this is the most interesting
contextualization of The Stars and Stripes Forever, as it still embodies a love for
patriotism; yet, the definition of patriotism is the one factor in this version of the piece
that makes it different from the original, with respect to tone and identity.
44 Phil Ochs, “The War is Over,” 1968.
45 James E. Perone, Music of the Counterculture Era: American History through Music. Greenwood
Publishing Group, 2004, 51.

25. Extrom 25
Chet Atkins, a famous guitarist during the 1970’s (who also worked with Homer
and Jethro in the recording studio), also performed a popular rendition on guitar in
1978.46 The YouTube video that I reference shows that the performance took place in a
barn-like setting with a stage, and that Chet was accompanied by a banjo and one drum,
implying that guitar was the main solo instrument of the piece (instead of the piccolo,
which was Sousa’s original intention. From here onward, it seems that the piccolo solo is
taken over by improvisatory moments). Thus, part of the patriotism cleverly inserted into
the music itself is lost. Atkins—who took away most all instrumentation and turned the
piece into a guitar solo—gives The Stars and Stripes Forever a more somber tone, yet he
still chooses to play it at his concert. For Atkins, it still embodies national pride—he even
regards Sousa as “one of America’s greatest composers”, signifying that he did not mean
to disrespect Sousa by taking the song out of its original performance context.47 It just is
not the level that Sousa had in mind when he wrote the piece.
Though perhaps no longer protesting the Vietnam War, The Stars and Stripes
Forever still lives on in the country scene today, played in guitar and banjo ensembles.
The Big Mama Sue Quartet, which features banjos, piano, a washboard, and a kazoo to
take on the piccolo line of the piece, embodies a new type of excitement from the music.
In a YouTube video featuring this quartet, the audience becomes most excited when Big
Mama Sue simultaneously plays the kazoo and the washboard, and they even begin to
clap toward the end when all of the instruments come together. Though the
instrumentation is different, Sousa’s composition still inspires passion.48
46 Chet Atkins, “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” (1978). YouTube, 2008.
47 Ibid.
48 Big Mama Sue Quartet “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” Jazz Bash by the Sea. Monterey,California,
2012.

26. Extrom 26
Conclusion:
Though it has been used in different performance contexts—from the concert hall
to the concert barn —The Stars and Stripes Forever still carries a patriotic tone with its
name. The melody is more-or-less the same in all performances throughout the past
century; the change is in the different ways in which the song manifests patriotism. Sousa
purposely used the timbre of specific instruments to invoke the sounds of birds chirping,
guns firing, or men marching. However, over time, different musicians began to
understand the piece in different ways, and thus changed the performance quality of the
piece. The performances themselves evoke patriotism, and thus take on the role that the
specific instrumentation once had.

27. Extrom 27
Bibliography
Primary Sources:
Homer and Jethro, “Crazy Mixed Up Song,” 1955.
Sousa, John Philip. The Stars and Stripes Forever. The John Church Company, 1897.
Sousa, John Philip. The Stars and Stripes Forever. Notated Music. Retrieved from the
Library of Congress.
Sousa, John Philip. "The Stars and Stripes Forever Lyrics." USA Flag Site. N.p., n.d.
Web. 20 Nov. 2015.
William Herman, Rau. "Paris Exposition 1900 Sousa Band ‘Stars & Stripes Forever.’"
1900.
Secondary Sources:
Bierley, Paul E. The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa. Music in American Life.
Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2006.
Bierley, Paul E. John Philip Sousa, American Phenomenon. Rev. ed. Columbus, Ohio:
Integrity Press, 1986.
Sony Ebook Library, “The Stars and Stripes Forever”,
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Sony Ebook Library, “Homer and Jethro”,
http://sonyebooklibrary.com/articles/Homer_and_Jethro
Sousa, John Philip. 1993. “Machine Songs IV: The Menace of Mechanical Music”.
Computer Music Journal 17 (1). The MIT Press: 14–18.
Sousa, John Philip. Revised Edition Marching Along. Edited by Paul E. Bierley.
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