Music - The Stars and Stripes Forever - Funky Doodle Version

My friend Tom who worked for Disney Imagineering used to call the version of Yankee Doodle in America Sings at Disneyland "Funky Doodle."

Below is a YouTube clip of The Stars and Stripes Forever in that same funky style.  I love it!

If you pay attention you'll hear a jazzy version of the piccolo part played Hamond Organ style.

I've started the clip approx where Stars and Stripes begins, but feel free to restart from the beginning! It's a sequence of great patriotic music arranged Disney-style. 

 

Music - The Stars and Stripes Forever - Piano Transcription

The famous Horowitz somehow transcribed The Stars and Stripes Forever for piano.

Including the piccolo part!

Even as I watch this modern performance by Emily Bear I'm stunned at all of the parts being played simultaneously. 

Here's Horowitz, sadly, without video:

He rides the pedal pretty heavily. I think his rendition of the piccolo part is better than Emily's performance. What I love about Emily's performance is that she doesn't ride the pedal, and with the video you can see what a workout it is to play The Stars and Stripes Forever.

Music - The Stars And Stripes Forever - and 94 Piccolos

I have a set of cassette tapes that are biographies of composers.

Souza is one of the composer in my tape set!

I learned from the Souza tape, many years ago, you know, when cassette tapes were playable, often in vehicles, that Souza woke up one morning with the Stars and Stripes Forever clearly composed in his mind.  He just had to write it down.

One of the more striking bits of Stars and Stripes is the piccolo part near the end.

In the YouTube video below, the orchestra plays it through normally, and then reprises the piccolo part with 94 people!