Jazz was the most popular form of music during the war, but there were audiences for country music, western swing, blues and R&B, rhythm and blues.
It was hard to keep bands together. By October, 1942, the jazz magazine Down Beat was running a regular feature called "Killed in Action" listing musicians who had been lost. At one point, there were over 60 bandleaders who enlisted. Others, like Benny Goodman, who couldn't qualify because of health or age volunteered to go to the troops through the USO or who made special "V-Discs" that were distributed to troops.
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