{"id":6104,"date":"2026-05-30T09:23:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T13:23:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/?p=6104"},"modified":"2026-05-30T09:26:49","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T13:26:49","slug":"gary-davis-march","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-march\/","title":{"rendered":"United States March (Reverend Gary Davis)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"United States March (Rev. Gary Davis)\" width=\"474\" height=\"267\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ARyyepC7p18?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This is Gary Davis&#8217;s take on a couple of marches, which were, like everything he played, transformed in his hands. The second section is a loose paraphrase of John Philip Sousa&#8217;s &#8220;Washington Post March&#8221;; I don&#8217;t recognize the first section; if someone else does, please let me know and I&#8217;ll rewrite this.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-2409\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Guitar-and-Banjo-of-Rev-Gary-Davis-e1485619938217.jpg?resize=240%2C238&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"240\" height=\"238\" \/>Like most of Davis&#8217;s instrumentals, I first heard this on the LP <em>The Guitar and Banjo of Reverend Gary Davis<\/em>. I would have been maybe twelve years old\u00a0 and have to admit I probably found this piece particularly appealing, maybe even more exciting than &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/cincinnati-flow-rag\/\">Cincinnati Flow Rag<\/a>&#8221; or &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/boy-was-kissing\/\">The Boy Was Kissing the Girl (and Playing the Guitar at the Same Time)<\/a>, because I could identify it with something other than ragtime-blues guitar, and play it for people who weren&#8217;t into those styles, and they might be impressed.<\/p>\n<p>It was also the first Davis instrumental I learned, thanks to <em>Sing Out!<\/em>, which printed tablature for it in 1972. As I&#8217;ve explained in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/anybody-going-san-antone\/\">a previous post<\/a>, the Cambridge Public Library, which was right next to my high school, had a surprisingly good music department, and among other things subscribed to <em>Sing Out!<\/em> <img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-6106 alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Sing-Out-21-4-scaled-e1779468225104.jpg?resize=242%2C340&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" width=\"242\" height=\"340\" \/>I didn&#8217;t get there till 1973, but they kept five years of back issues, and around that time I read in Abbie Hoffman&#8217;s <em>Steal this Book<\/em> that libraries de-accessioned old magazines and would happily give them to anyone who asked, so I asked, and for the next couple of years got the six-year-old copies of old <em>Sing Out!<\/em> Then got a phone call that the library was stopping its subscription and I could pick up the whole remaining five years of copies&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;so I did, and still have them, including the one with tab for this, which it anachronistically titled &#8220;Civil War Parade.&#8221; The transcription was provided by Jack Baker, who I see is still giving <a href=\"http:\/\/frettedinstrumentsnyc.com\">guitar lessons<\/a> and has tab online for lots of classic fingerstyle pieces, though not this one. I have no idea how accurate it is, since by the time I got serious about studying Davis&#8217;s playing, I was far more interested in his gospel and ragtime arrangements (like &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/samson-and-delilah\/\">Samson and Delilah<\/a>,&#8221; &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/sit-down-on-the-banks\/\">Goin&#8217; to Sit Down on the Banks of the River<\/a>,&#8221; &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/you-got-to-move\/\">You Got to Move<\/a>,&#8221; &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/cincinnati-flow-rag\/\">Cincinnati Flow<\/a>&#8221; and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-medley\/\">a bunch of others<\/a>), and I never went back to work out how he played this one &#8212; with the result that I would guess what I&#8217;m playing here is pretty much what I learned from Baker&#8217;s tab.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m not a fan of military marches and pretty much put this aside, but it had an important role in my education, since it was the first piece I ever learned in the key of F &#8212; which became one of my favorite fingerpicking keys &#8212; as well as being the inspiration for &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/perrys-march\/\">Perry&#8217;s March<\/a>,&#8221; by Perry Lederman, which I recorded on my lone LP. And, more than fifty years later, though I&#8217;ve forgotten lots of other pieces I learned over the years, I find that I still remember how to play it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This is Gary Davis&#8217;s take on a couple of marches, which were, like everything he played, transformed in his hands. The second section is a loose paraphrase of John Philip Sousa&#8217;s &#8220;Washington Post March&#8221;; I don&#8217;t recognize the first section; if someone else does, please let me know and I&#8217;ll rewrite this. Like most of &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-march\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">United States March (Reverend Gary Davis)<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6104","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>United States March (Reverend Gary Davis) - Old Friends: A Songobiography<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Reverend Gary Davis&#039;s take on a pair of Sousa marches, learned from Sing Out! magazine over fifty years ago.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-march\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"United States March (Reverend Gary Davis) - Old Friends: A Songobiography\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Reverend Gary Davis&#039;s take on a pair of Sousa marches, learned from Sing Out! magazine over fifty years ago.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-march\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Old Friends: A Songobiography\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-05-30T13:23:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-05-30T13:26:49+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Guitar-and-Banjo-of-Rev-Gary-Davis-e1485619938217.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Elijah Wald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ElijahWald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ElijahWald\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Elijah Wald\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Elijah Wald\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\"},\"headline\":\"United States March (Reverend Gary Davis)\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-05-30T13:23:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-05-30T13:26:49+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":536,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/20e4f69f2f284ea0ff728a9d1b7720a9\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2017\\\/01\\\/Guitar-and-Banjo-of-Rev-Gary-Davis-e1485619938217.jpg\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/\",\"name\":\"United States March (Reverend Gary Davis) - Old Friends: A Songobiography\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/gary-davis-march\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.elijahwald.com\\\/songblog\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2017\\\/01\\\/Guitar-and-Banjo-of-Rev-Gary-Davis-e1485619938217.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-05-30T13:23:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-05-30T13:26:49+00:00\",\"description\":\"The Reverend Gary Davis's take on a pair of Sousa marches, learned from Sing Out! 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As explained in earlier posts, I shied away from most of Davis's material because I was not interested in\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Harlem.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":2408,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/cincinnati-flow-rag\/","url_meta":{"origin":6104,"position":2},"title":"Cincinnati Flow Rag (Rev. Gary Davis)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"January 28, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"I always loved Gary Davis's guitar playing, but was into blues and ragtime a long time before I got into gospel music -- so for many years my favorite of his albums was The Guitar & Banjo of Reverend Gary Davis.\u00a0 As far as I know, this is the only\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/01\/Guitar-and-Banjo-of-Rev-Gary-Davis-1.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5846,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/sit-down-on-the-banks\/","url_meta":{"origin":6104,"position":3},"title":"Goin&#8217; to Sit Down on the Banks of the River (Rev. 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Gary Davis)","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"September 1, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Reverend Gary Davis has always been at the top of my list of guitar heroes and influences, along with Mississippi John Hurt, Dave Van Ronk, Joseph Spence, and Jean-Bosco Mwenda. I've gone through a couple of periods of immersion in his playing, but don't tend to perform my favorite arrangements,\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Gary-Davis-LP1-e1725053629451.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3991,"url":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/gary-davis-medley\/","url_meta":{"origin":6104,"position":5},"title":"Gary Davis Medley","author":"Elijah Wald","date":"September 22, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"I can't remember when I first heard Rev. Gary Davis, but he was one of my guitar heroes long before I could even think about playing his music. I loved the power and virtuosity of his playing, the soulful\u00a0 excitement of his singing, the dynamics, the dynamism... So by my\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/Rev-Gary-Davis-Pure-Religion.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6104","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6104"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6113,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6104\/revisions\/6113"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.elijahwald.com\/songblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}