If you are a bandmaster and you think you've had a bad day, you need this short book to show you just how bad it can get.

As official bandmaster to the President of the United States, Sousa recalls his own nightmares on the bandstand. There's the new president who doesn't like music, the visiting diplomat who's anthem is suddenly vanished from the bandbook, or the night only he and the bass drum turned out for the gig, the night the fireworks caught fire, and the first night they, the Union's Marine Band, was to play for the Confederate South.

There's not much structure to the book; they didn't care much about that sort of thing back then, Sousa just flits ad hoc from anecdote to anecdote like you're sitting in a pub with John Philip himself when he says, "Did I ever tell you about the time ..."