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| SIDNEY WEST SULLIVAN | | |
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Navy Junior Revisited 1938-1958, a Memoir © 2020
donated to Missouri State Historical Society, catalogued at Merlin Library System |
| Show Me Music | | Shape notes fill The Missouri Harmony; musical farces like "The Poor Soldier" play in theaters. Joseph William Postlewaite publishes Shenandoah. In St. Louis, music is taught in public schools. Lew Johnson organizes his first permanent minstrel troupe; in Miami, John William "Blind" Boone is born. Saint Joseph's Daily Herald calls an evening with the Hyers Sisters "a rare musical treat;" Kansas City sends the Montezuma quickstep to the Library of Congress. SLSO, the second professional symphony orchestra in the USA, is formed. The Marshall family leaves a Saline County farm for Sedalia and provides a home for Scott Joplin who teaches Arthur Owen Marshall ("Kinklets," "Missouri Romp," "Little Jack's Rag") before "Maple Leaf Rag" makes Joplin world famous. The Miami Brass Band entertains at the World's Fair; in St. Joseph, Coleman Hawkins is born; in Maplewood, Pee Wee Russell is born; in Kansas City, Ben Webster is born; in Boonville, Julia Lee is born "to sing the songs her mother taught her not to sing." In St. Louis, Shorty Baker is born; Brunswick's Wilbur Sweatman (Sensational Swet) begins his long career with "Down Home Rag." Bennie Moten and the Kansas City Orchestra record the Kansas City Shuffle; the Gilliam and Malta Bend Concert Bands flourish; Charlie Creath and his Jazz-O-Maniacs rock riverboats; Josephine Baker and her pet cheetah Chiquita rattle Paris.Pete Johnson gives us blues we can use. Clark Terry serves as a bandsman in the USN; Jane Froman takes "With a Song in My Heart" to Europe; Charlie "Bird" Parker launches the Third Stream. In Lee's Summit, Pat Metheny is born; we get Night Train from Jimmy Forrest; Chuck Berry sings "Maybellene;" Anita O'Day has plenty to say. It's high time for Count Basie and the Kansas City 7. Sara Evans is born in Boonville and raised on a farm near New Franklin; Porter Wagoner (Mr. Grand Ole Opry) turns out more and more singles. "The Buck Stops Here" at the Arrow Rock Lyceum reminds us President Harry Truman tickled mean ivories. We listen to the Multicultural Children's Songs of Ella Jenkins, maybe turn to Eminem's Infinite. Or Tech N9ne's Something Else or The Urge or Barbara Carr's Talk to Me or The Very Best of Sheryl Crow. Half a century after Bold Conceptions, and then One, Two, Three, and the lovely Heads, etc., Marshall's Bob James comes home with Independence's own Mike Henderson; D. J. Sweeney sings in Kansas City; Jeremiah Johnson releases Blues Heart Attack. Never Shout Never, Living Things, and Miami's Jake Clements perform; the Marshall Municipal Band celebrates its centennial; nonagenarian Burt Bacharach collaborates on "Blue Umbrella." | Countless musicians --
Enough to flood the soul
While time's insistent drumroll
Touches all Missourians.
Twenty decades gone
But the melody stays
And the heartland sways
As the beat goes on. | | | From Deep Roots in Missouri, © 2021 |
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