Yesterday, I had the pleasure of hosting an online talk by David Suisman, associate professor of history at the University of Delaware and author of Instrument of War: Music and the Making of America’s Soldiers (University of Chicago Press, 2024).
As someone with a research interest in military music myself, I found Instrument of War to be a fascinating, deeply researched, and remarkably empathetic book. Suisman explores the role of music in the lives of American soldiers from the Civil War of the 1860s to the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan in recent years. He lays bare the US military’s intense and longstanding interest in music, but also shows how performing and listening habits have evolved over time, from the rise of radio to the era of the iPod. We learn about extensive official efforts to sponsor musical activity, from funding military bands to shipping song books, live performers, and olive-green pianos to war zones. The book casts music as a top-down tool used to manage soldiers’ behaviour and emotions but also remains admirably attuned to the actual preferences and priorities of enlisted men. Music, it turns out, has much to tell us about the character of the US military and its social and political context, from questions of discipline and morale to race, imperialism and much else besides.
A recording of Professor Suisman’s engaging and enlightening talk is now available on the Cambridge Centre for Geopolitics YouTube channel. The book is available from the publisher here.
1812 and all that 