Stars & Stripes Forever…With A Percussive Twist

As this extended 4th of July weekend comes to a close, we’ve probably heard and/or played the classic John Philip Sousa march Stars & Stripes Forever more times than we care to admit. Well, I’m going to make you listen to it a few more times, but with a little twist that you may appreciate.

Eric Carr, better known as YouTube personality EMC Drums, posted his performance of Stars & Stripes on Independence Day. Eric’s take was unique as he performed the piccolo feature on a set of custom “mega tenors” with a drum for each note in the chromatic scale. The result was a fun percussive variation on a patriotic classic:

This isn’t the first time I’ve experienced a percussive variation on the piccolo feature, though. During my age out season with the Glassmen in 1996, we performed Stars & Stripes as our opener. To finish that section of the show, our bass drummers, appropriately playing on piccolo bass drums, played the piccolo feature;

I don’t know of any other performances with this kind of take on the feature. If you do, let me know!