Posted on 05/25/2016 7:20:38 AM PDT by Borges
Classifying anyone as the “most successful” at anything tends to reflect more on the source than the subject. So keep that in mind when I make the following statement: John Philip Sousa is the most successful American musician of all time.
Marching music is a maddeningly durable genre, recognizable to pretty much everyone who has lived in the United States for any period. It works as a sonic shorthand for any filmmaker hoping to evoke the late 19th century and serves as the auditory backdrop for national holidays, the circus and college football. It’s not “popular” music, but it’s entrenched within the popular experience. It will be no less fashionable tomorrow than it is today.
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What is a “Rock Star”?
“Sousa and Scott Joplin are probably the two most enduring American composers of their time.”
Add Stephen Foster to that and I can agree. I think he was probably the most prolific and many of his >200 songs are recognized without anyone realizing their origin.
(Old Kentucky Home, Camptown Races, Old Folks at Home, Oh Susanna, etc etc)
In junior high all the trombone players were big Chicago fans, because of 25 or 6 to 4. Nobody had ever heard anyone play 16th notes on a trombone before.
My kid sister was a 70’s rock girl. :-)
She was a HUGE Chicago fan. I remember going with her to one of their concerts (I think it was Madison Square Garden). They were excellent!
One of the 70’s bands I liked was Emerson Lake and Palmer. I went to one of their concerts (also at Madison Square Garden). They did “Pictures at an Exhibition”. I was blown away!
Keith Richards? The historians of the future will just knock on his door and ask him questions. That man will never die. Too pickled!
The Beatles.
Neal Peart. Arguably, the best drummer out there.
Alice Cooper.
He just turned 75 yesterday, Dylan.
Rock & Roll is already over.None of the “Music” will be remembered for itself. All that will be remembered is an act in an historical sense, and that will be the Beatles.
Disco.
A lot of groups from that era look good by comparison, whether or not they actually were.
Want some fun. Get the Music to ‘Hello young Lovers’, and the lyrics to, ‘The times the are a changing”. Now sing the lyrics to the melody. Notice anything?
Elvis Elvis Elvis. But then I repeat myself.
Elvis.
Elvis “maddeningly durable” Presley
My humerous, esoteric question related only to the many deceased Spinal Tap drummers. Not real drummers.
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