Published: 2024

Publisher: Print Music Source

Duration: 3:03

Grade: 3

Difficulty: Medium

Composed in 1885, In Storm and Sunshine is one of the most enduring circus marches, or “screamers”. Heed was a gifted young cornetist and bandmaster from New Jersey. Composed when he was only 23 years old, it is uncertain whether In Storm and Sunshine was created specifically for a circus, but has nonetheless established itself as a circus favorite and stands as the best known of Heed’s sixty marches. The quick tempo and pounding rhythms are meant to accompany the chaos and thundering hooves of four-footed animals running into a circus arena instead of the steady, regimented pulse of men marching.

Presumably, the title refers to minor and major modes, hence the “storms” and the “sunshine.” Although nearly all of Heed’s marches were written after In Storm and Sunshine, it has remained the most popular