'Taps' Today a Fading Tradition

He marched past the palm trees, the headstones, the limousine and the hearse. Under his arm he carried a silver horn, light in weight but robust with history. He stopped yards away from the South Florida VA National Cemetery's memorial site on a bed of grass. A family stepped out of the limo. A flag-draped coffin was carried from the hearse. Three riflemen shot three volleys into the air. And then it was his time to play the somber song of Americana, a tune etched in our collective memory but fading away from singular moments like this. Sgt. Keston Marin plays taps. It is a skill that fewer service people have, prompting musicians and politicians to question how to keep pure one of the country's most honored traditions. Marin, 24, of Coconut Creek, alters the tradition. He uses the trumpet -- not the valve-free bugle. In the... [read full story]