John Philip Sousa
John Philip Sousa, America’s foremost composer of march music, was born in Washington, D. C., on November 6, 1854. The son of a trombone player in the United States Marine Band, John Philip early received music instruction, mainly the violin from John Esputa. When he was about thirteen, John enlisted in the Marine Corps where he played in its band for two years. For several years after that he played the violin in and conducted the orchestras of various theaters; in the summer of 1877 he played in an orchestra conducted by Jacques Offenbach at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition. Between 1880 and 1892 he was the musical director of the Marine Band. It was during this period that he wrote his first famous marches. In 1892 he formed a band of his own with which he toured Europe and America for many years, and with which he gave more than a thousand concerts. His most popular marches (together with his best transcriptions for band of national ballads and patriotic airs) were always the highlights of his concerts. Besides the marches, Sousa wrote the music for numerous comic operas, the most famous being El Capitan (1896) and The Bride Elect (1898). In 1918 Sousa and his band were heard in the Hippodrome extravaganza, Everything. He published his autobiography, Marching Along, in 1928, and died in Reading, Pennsylvania, on March 6, 1932.
In the closing years of the 19th century, and in the first part of the 20th, America was undergoing expansion in many directions: art, science, literature, commerce, finance, world affairs. Hand in hand with this development and growth came an aroused patriotism and an expanding chauvinism. Sousa’s marches were the voice of this new and intense national consciousness.
As Sigmund Spaeth has pointed out, most of Sousa’s famous marches follow a similar pattern, beginning with “an arresting introduction, then using a light, skipping rhythm for his first melody, going from that into a broader tune,” then progressing to the principal march melody. A massive climax is finally realized with new, vibrant colors being realized in the main march melody through striking new combinations of instruments.
The following are some of Sousa’s most popular marches:
El Capitan (1896) was adapted from a choral passage from the comic opera of the same name. This music was played aboard Admiral Dewey’s flagship, Olympia, when it steamed down Manila Bay for battle during the Spanish-American War. And it was again heard, this time performed by Sousa’s own band, when Dewey was welcomed as a conquering hero in New York on September 30, 1900.
King Cotton (1895) was written on the occasion of the engagement of the Sousa Band at the Cotton States Exposition. Semper Fideles (1888) was Sousa’s first famous composition in march tempo, and to this day it is still one of his best known marches, a perennial favorite with parades of all kinds. Since Sousa sold this march outright for $35.00 he never capitalized on its immense popularity.
Sousa’s masterpiece—and probably one of the most famous marches ever written—was the Stars and Stripes Forever, completed on April 26, 1897. In 1897 Sousa was a tourist in Italy when he heard the news that his friend and manager had died in the United States. Sousa decided to return home. Aboard the Teutonic a march melody kept haunting him. As soon as he came home he put the melody down on paper, and it became the principal subject of “The Stars and Stripes Forever.” This principal melody achieves an unforgettable climax in the march when it is proudly thundered by the full orchestra to figurations in the piccolo.
The Thunderer and The Washington Post March were written in 1889. The latter was commissioned by the Washington Post for the ceremonies attending the presentation of prizes in a student essay contest.
Among Sousa’s other marches are The Bride Elect (1897) from the comic opera of the same name; The Fairest of the Fair (1908); Hands Across the Sea (1899); Invincible Eagle (1901); and Saber and Spurs (1915) dedicated to the United States Cavalry.
It was long maintained that Sousa was the composer of the famous hymn of the Artillery branch of the United States armed services, “The Caisson Song.” Sousa played this march in his own brilliant new band arrangement at a Liberty Loan Drive at the Hippodrome, in New York, in 1918. For some time thereafter Sousa was credited as being the composer. But further research revealed the fact that the words and music had been written in 1908 by Edmund L. Gruber, then a lieutenant with the 5th Artillery in the Philippines.