Spending the last few days at the VA Hospital has brought back some long-repressed memories of my military days.
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| Also repressed memories of bad modernist architecture |
"What's that?" you ask, in that obnoxious, shocked tone of voice I'm sure you use in such cases, "Roscoe Willis, masterful composer, humanitarian, and committed socialist, spent time in the Navy?"
Why, yes, of course I did. I daresay I'm even proud of it. (Excellent guess about it being the Navy, by the way. The Army wound up with Sam Barber, much to their disappointment, I'm sure.) After all, this was during the Second World War, when for one brief moment, all of us, regardless of political background, were united in the common cause of killing Nazis. I did my part by writing some music designed to increase our boys' enthusiasm for said killing. My oratorio "Let Freedom Ring," while perhaps not up to the level of some of my later masterpieces, received a number of stirring performances, including one on the deck of the USS Yorktown accompanied by the Marine Band and several rounds of anti-aircraft fire when a Japanese Kamikaze attempted to interrupt the concert.
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| Luckily I decided not to wear my good tuxedo |
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