John Phillip Sousa
b. 6 November 1854, Washington, DC, USA, d. 6 March 1932. At the age of 13 Sousa joined the US Marine band of which his father (born in Spain of Portuguese parents) was a member. Here he mostly played the violin but in 1873 he left the band and resumed his studies, particularly of harmony and composition. In 1876 he joined a symphony orchestra in Philadelphia and also began to direct musical productions. In 1880 he returned to the US Marine band, this time as its director. After 12 years he formed his own band and embarked on a hugely successful career. Sousa employed first class musicians, among them the outstandingly gifted trombonist Arthur Pryor. In the late 19th century, touring bands, usually bright and brassy, played a mixture of European light classical music, newly-popular rags and other popular pieces. Sousa included all such items in his repertoire alongside cakewalks and music which bore the hallmarks of early jazz, but he arranged everything in a highly personal style. He also featured his own compositions, many of which were marches and which earned him the soubriquet, The March King. Before World War I Sousa and his band had made several tours to Europe and one around the world. The band remained in existence for almost four decades, building a reputation for Sousa as a musical director and composer. In both capacities he had an enormous influence upon popular musical taste in the USA. His first major work was an operetta, EL CAPITAN (1895), and he also wrote several vocal pieces, ranging from minstrelsy to grandiose national pageants. It was, however, his marches which made his name. Among the best known are The Washington Post, Hands Across The Sea, Semper Fidelis, El Capitan, The Thunderer and The Stars And Stripes Forever. He died in March 1932.