Customer Reviews

Patriotic Music of America

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Do you remember a story several years ago about a music group that called themselves "The Original Artists", then published an album playing everyone else's music? That seems to be what we've got here. This album is played by a group calling themselves, "The American Military Band". When the album arrived, there were no liner notes, no information on who the performers are, and just flags on the label. Pop in the CD, and it brings back memories of days gone by. Remember what it was like to be sitting near the 3rd chair clarinets in high school, or better yet, the kid who played the alto sax without any sense of timing? Ok, be fair I said to myself, Listen to it! Ok, there are timing changes that people miss, bad notes, and some jumbles that sound like marching band practice. There is some balance. The group does a decent job on the pure brass sections of the louder marches, but the piccolo player in Stars/Stripes forever gets lost a couple of times. This album is enjoyable only so far as you get to hear the tunes you love. If you want to get a professional recording though, look elsewhere.

I selected this recording because of the wide variety of songs it contained. I love all of these military and patriotic songs, and have quite fond memories of playing them in band in school.

However, the musicianship on this recording is TERRIBLE. The songs are okay, recognizable, but listening to the clarinets and piccolo's screech out of tune and against the timing of the rest of the band-well that just killed my ability to focus on the overall performance of these songs.

So my two stars are for the collection of songs, the missing 3 stars are for what The American Military Band did to these songs.

For a more professional sounding recording, I would recommend "American Anthems" performed by Gramercy Brass and conducted by John Henry Lambert, also for sale on Amazon.com. It has some of the songs featured on this CD, but the musicianship is dazzling compared to this feeble recording. You can also hear samples of the recordings on "American Anthems"-if they had samples of the recordings on "Patriotic Music of America", I surely would have skipped this purchase.

A variety of music that made America. Everything from the National Anthem to Taps. Themes of the Armed Forces and John Phillip Sousa's "Stars and Stripes Forever" are included. We used this CD as background for a two-hour 4th of July Parade in Burien, WA.

MY PARENTS LOVED THIS CD THEY MET IN THE SERVICE SO THESE SONGS MEAN A LOT MORE THAN JUST PATRIOTISM TO THEM...THANKS

I honestly believe that this CD is mislabeled because it sounds as though the musicians are all kids. I could not help but laugh at several of the tracks for I was expecting a professionally recorded album. I will not listen to this CD again and am extremely disappointed.

Our sports club held a 4th of July picnic party at the pool. Patriotic Music was the perfect background for the fun day!