A biography for John Philip Sousahasn’t been written yet.
“Grand opera is the most powerful of stage appeals and that almost entirely through the beauty of music.”
“Jazz will endure as long as people hear it through their feet instead of their brains”
“The movements which I make I cannot possibly repress because, at the time, I am actually the idea I am interpreting, and naturally I picture my players and auditors as in accord with me. I know, of course, that my mannerisms have been widely discussed.”
“I think that the quality of all bands is steadily improving and it is a pleasant thought to me that perhaps the efforts of Sousa's Band have quickened that interest and improved that quality.”
“The average music-lover hears only the production under prevailing conditions.”
“My success is not due to any personal superiority over other people.”
“America can well expect to develop a goodly amount of composers for she has a goodly number of people.”
“Is it not the business of the conductor to convey to the public in its dramatic form the central idea of a composition; and how can he convey that idea successfully if he does not enter heart and soul into the life of the music and the tale it unfolds?”
“The office of President is a great one; to every true American it seems the greatest on earth. And to me, as I was engaged in weaving a background of music for the pageantry of it, there came a deeper realization of the effect of that office on the man.”