Country Band March

Description

• Composer: Charles Ives
• Arranger: James Sinclair
• Publisher: Theodore Presser Company

From the "out of tune" introduction to the pandemonium which reigns at the close, the Country Band March is a marvelous parody of the realities of performance by a country band. While the main march theme is probably Ives' own, the march features an impressive list of quotations that includes "Arkansas Traveler,"Battle Cry of Freedom,"British Grenadiers,"The Girl I Left Behind Me,"London Bridge,"Marching Through Georgia,"Massa's in de Cold, Cold Ground,"My Old Kentucky Home,"Violets,"Yankee Doodle,"May Day Waltz" and "Semper Fidelis." There is rarely anything straight-forward about the use of this material; the tunes are subjected to Ives's famous techniques of "poly-everything." Of particular interest is Ives's use of ragtime elements to enliven this already spirited march.)