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559248 bk Sousa 22/7/10 10:42 Page 4 concocted to be the perfect music for a new dance Program notes by Keith Brion are freely based on called the “two-step”. The trio melody contains a little material taken from “The Works of John Philip Sousa,” AMERICAN CLASSICS melodic half step dip and return that mirrors the Integrity Press with the expressed permission of the sideways tilt used by the partners in the new dance. The author, Paul E. Bierley. The introduction is extracted jaunty 6/8 march-time has echoes of the older waltz from Roger Ruggeri’s program notes for the Milwaukee rhythm that was receding in popularity but it adds the Symphony. peppiness and faster pace of the polka. At any rate the tune caught fire with dancers. By the early 1890s Special thanks for their assistance in preparing this John Philip dancing the two-step to the music of Sousa’s The recording to: Loras Schissel, Sousa Collection, Library Washington Post March became the popular of Congress; John Sousa IV, Pres., John Philip Sousa ingredients that sparked a huge world-wide dance Inc.; Paul E. Bierley, Sousa’s biographer; John Bierley, SOUSA craze. cover photo assistance; Brian Holt, New Sousa Band, percussion consultant; The United States Marine Band; Keith Brion and The Sousa Collection at the University of Illinois. Music for Wind Band • 8 The Royal Artillery Band The High School Cadets (by permission of the Director of Music, Royal Artillery, Lt. Col. Malcolm Torrent) The Northern Pines The Royal Artillery Band had their “drum and fife” as long ago as 1557, but it was the need for a “band of musik” in the regiment that led to the formation of the Royal Artillery Band in 1762. Since 1764, the band has been quartered with the Royal Artillery regiment in Woolwich, SE London. Today’s band employs over fifty musicians El Capitan who, in keeping with tradition, must be accomplished on both orchestral and wind band instruments. The band may appear on one day as a symphonic wind band (one of the largest in the British army), the next as a marching unit, and at another time as a full symphony orchestra (England’s oldest established symphony orchestra). Their Boy Scouts of America conductor and Director of Music at the time of these recordings was Lt. Col. Malcolm Torrent. Crusader March Keith Brion Keith Brion leads his own New Sousa Band and is a frequent conductor of light music orchestral concerts throughout America and internationally. He is a specialist in Sousa’s period style and has published numerous performing editions of his music. Royal Artillery Band Keith Brion 8.559248 4 559248 bk Sousa 22/7/10 10:42 Page 2 John Philip Sousa (1854-1932) section. An early review said the march “… absolutely 9 Comrades of the Legion (1920) breathes the boy; it visualizes the supple step of the boy Dedicated to “My comrades of the American Legion”, Works for Wind Band, Volume 8 marching, and not the heavy tread of the man”. the march Comrades of the Legion was a feature of John Philip Sousa personified turn-of-the-century symphonic poems, suites, operas and operettas. His Sousa’s 1920 national tour. 500,000 copies of the America, the comparative innocence and brash energy principles of instrumentation and tonal color influenced 5 Crusader (1888) band’s recording of the march were sold in advance of of a still new nation. His ever touring band represented many classical composers. His robust, patriotic Crusader was written shortly after Sousa was the pressing. The musical outlook is grand, martial and America across the globe and brought music to operettas of the 1890s helped introduce a truly native “knighted” as a Mason in Columbia Commandery No. generous. hundreds of American towns. John Philip Sousa, born musical attitude in American theater. 2, Knights Templar, Washington DC. The Knights 6th November, 1854, reached this exalted position with Templar are theoretically derived from the Crusades. 0 Pride of Pittsburgh (1901) startling quickness. In 1880, at the age of 26, he became 1 The High School Cadets (1890) The march is one of Sousa’s most wild and The grand march Pride of Pittsburgh was written for conductor of the U.S. Marine Band. In twelve years the Sousa’s march The High School Cadets was dedicated adventurous, but at the same it is remarkably the dedication of the Music Hall at the Western vastly improved ensemble won high renown and to a high school drill team in what was at the time compositionally integrated with closely connected Pennsylvania Exposition in Pittsburgh where the Sousa Sousa’s compositions earned him the title of “The Washington DC’s only high school, later to become materials throughout the piece. To date, no one has Band played an annual engagement for many years. March King”. Sousa went one better with the formation Central High School. Since Sousa had already written a identified any of the melodies with Masonic music. Sousa claimed it was one of the most difficult pieces he of his own band in 1892, bringing world acclaim. march (The National Fencibles) for another drill team, had ever written… since he was trying to combine the In its first seven years the band gave 3500 concerts; the students asked Sousa to write them “something 6 O Warrior Grim (1895) themes of Ethelbert Nevin’s very popular tune in an era of train and ship travel it logged over a million superior”. In Sousa’s estimation he did write a better Sousa often employed arias from his successful Narcissus with Stephen Foster’s Come Where My Love miles in nearly four decades. There were European march. operettas as cornet solos. O Warrior Grim was a Lies Dreaming and a new Sousa march tune, all to be tours in 1900, 1901, 1903, and 1905, and a world tour popular soprano solo from the operetta El Capitan. The eventually played together. Nevin and Foster were both in 1910-11, the zenith of the band era. 2 The Northern Pines (1931) soloist here is Milton Hinton, principal cornetist of the popular American composers hailing from the The unprecedented popularity of the Sousa Band Named for the tall and beautiful pine trees that blanket Band of the Royal Artillery. Pittsburgh area. The title Pride of Pittsburgh was came at a time when few American orchestras existed. the National Music Camp at Interlochen in northern chosen by a competition in the Pittsburgh papers. Sousa From the Civil War to about 1920, band concerts were Michigan, the late and jaunty Sousa march The 7 On the Campus (1920) also used the title Homage to Foster and Nevin when he the most important aspect of U.S. musical life. No finer Northern Pines was dedicated to the students who came On the Campus was dedicated to “Collegians, past, performed the piece. band than Sousa’s was ever heard. Sousa modified the to the camp and to Dr Joseph Maddy, its founder. Sousa present and future”. The words were composed by brass band by decreasing the brass and percussion visited for the occasion and was the guest conductor of Sousa’s daughter, Mrs Helen Sousa Abert. The !-# At the King’s Court (1904) instruments, increasing its woodwinds, and adding a the assembled student band for the première. arrangement in this recording, echoes the collegiate The suite At the King’s Court was probably composed harp. His conducting genius attracted the finest scenes on the sheet music and adds the flavor of college in preparation for the Sousa Band’s 1905 tour to musicians, enabling him to build an ensemble capable 3 El Capitan: Selections (1895) hi-jinks from the roaring 1920s. England where it was played for King Edward VII at a of executing programs almost as varied as those of a Sousa’s operetta El Capitan was one of the earliest command performance. The first movement, “Her symphony orchestra. The Sousa Band became the musicals by an American composer to have a successful 8 Jack Tar (1903) Ladyship, the Countess, is gracious and elegant. The standard by which American bands were measured, run on Broadway. Set in colonial Peru, it tells a farcical Sousa hoped that the march Jack Tar would become as second, Her Grace, the Duchess, is a lovely waltz. The causing a dramatic upgrading in quality nationally. story of the Viceroy of Peru posing as a fearless rebel important to navy men as his Stars and Stripes Forever last movement, Her Majesty the Queen, is a powerfully Sousa’s compositions also spread his fame. Such leader fighting to unseat himself. The selection had become to army men. The march had its première soaring grand march. marches as The Stars and Stripes Forever, El Capitan, comprises the Prelude, I’ve a Most Decided Notion, in London’s Royal Albert Hall with the King and The Washington Post, and Semper Fidelis are Beautiful Land of Spain, Finale Act 2, A Typical Tune Queen present and was performed at that time by the $ The Washington Post (1889) universally acknowledged as the best of the genre. of Zanzibar, and Finale including the main themes of joint forces of the Coldstream Guards, Scots Guards, The Washington Post is the march that made Sousa Sousa said a march “should make a man with a wooden Sousa’s popular El Capitan March. Irish Guards, Himenoa Band of NZ, Sousa’s Band and famous, the march that made the newspaper famous and leg step out”, and his surely did. Although he the Queen’s Hall Orchestra.

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