Chapter II: Part 2

In 1942 Warrant Officer Alf Heiberg was appointed to organize and lead the new band. At Bolling Field, Washington, D. C., the national Headquarters of the U. S. Army Air Force, Officer Heiberg found a saxophone quartette happily playing “on their own.” With this group for a nucleus he began to assemble his band. It was an easier job than Heiberg had anticipated for there were many experienced and outstanding musicians among the fliers who were eager to play, and an adequate number of men were soon enrolled. They were all enthusiastic and practiced so faithfully that in an unbelievably short time the United States Air Force had a good band, one that compared favorably with the other service bands.

A new leader was assigned in March, 1944, Captain George Sallade Howard. He was the ideal man for the job, a man with talent, training and ideas. A highly educated musician. Captain Howard at forty had spent half his years in music teaching and directing bands and orchestras. An inspiring conductor, Captain Howard also possessed many original ideas which soon began to produce unusual results in his work with this new band.

After two months of intensive practice the Air Force Band went on a concert tour throughout eastern Canada. It was acclaimed by the critics as the finest concert band ever heard.

Upon returning to Washington the Band played at a command performance at the White House. That the program was successful was evident, as the Air Force Band was immediately sent on an exchange tour of Great Britain which brought the RAF Central Band to America.

From their first program in Royal Albert Hall in London, the Air Force Band was praised in highest terms by the foremost English musicians. At that time Britain was living on extremely short food and fuel rations. Many concerts were played by the Bandsmen bundled up in their heavy overcoats, and at times, even wearing their hats and gloves.

On account of the cold weather, and the unheated buildings, the people in England generally had colds. Consequently the audiences coughed noisily during the concerts, but they were enthusiastic over the fine playing of the great Air Force Band from America. Frequent air raids and buzz bombs also interfered with concert programs. After the “Battle of the Bulge” Captain Howard and his band returned to the United States.

At the end of the war in 1945, this Air Force group was disbanded. However, the United States Army Air Forces could not do without their fine band. Captain Howard had established his reputation as an unusually capable conductor. He was transferred to the permanent Air Force with the rank of Major and given the duty of organizing a permanent Air Force Band.

Only five of the one-hundred-piece wartime band were willing to reenlist. Major Howard had to start his new organization from the very beginning. He had decided ideas regarding the possibilities of a large military band and he proceeded to put them in force. Determined to have only the best musicians, he used the utmost care in selecting the players. Fully 1,100 men applied for admission and each one was critically auditioned.

One hundred and fifteen players were selected--a rare group--so many were experts, men who had occupied top places in topmost organizations. Some had been graduated from outstanding universities, others had played in famous orchestras, symphonic and popular swing bands. One player had been a symphony concertmeister, and the famous baritone soloist, Glenn Darwin, came from the Metropolitan Opera Company.

For his first assistant Major Howard appointed Chief Warrant Officer John F. Yesulaitis, who was not only a graduate in music, but also had an extensive military experience. He had been a bandleader in World War II and in charge of the 7th and 77th Infantry division bands in the South and West Pacific. He is the most decorated member of the band having made every landing and taken part in every important campaign in the Pacific.

Robert L. Landers, the director of the band’s famous glee club, “The Singing Sergeants,” is an important member of the Major’s staff. He has a Bachelor of Music degree from the Eastman School of Music, studied under Sir Thomas Beecham, Assistant Conductor of the San Carlo Opera Company, Leader of 529th Air Force Band at Atlantic City and also at Buckley Field in Denver.

These, and many other gifted artists, make up a splendid ensemble who are able at the same time to make their individual talents apparent. From this versatile organization, Colonel Howard--he was made a Lt. Colonel in 1949--can send out a marching band of one hundred or more men. He can choose eighty to ninety to form a symphonic band, seventy or as many as he likes for a concert orchestra. He has several dance bands, chamber music sextettes, and a well-balanced glee club.

A staff of music writers are kept at work making new arrangements, a well-trained narrator announces the program descriptions and reads the necessary script. And the maestro of this great band supervises the building of the programs which he rehearses and conducts for radio, concert stage and military duty. Besides these performances they average three concert tours a year, provide music for important military and state functions and represent the United States Air Force musically. The Air Force Band is usually in attendance when foreign diplomats or royalty happen to be in the Capital. During the summer military band concerts are given in various centers of Washington, and orchestra concerts are played during the winter in the Lisner auditorium. The concerts by the Air Force Band, as well as those by the other Service Bands, are free to the public.

Colonel Howard says, “We wanted a unit that was as streamlined as the Air Forces themselves.... We desired a band that could give a performance of _Scheherazade_ or _The Flying Dutchman_ comparable to that by any symphony orchestra, and in the next breath could rival Benny Goodman.”

In this they have succeeded.

LT. COLONEL GEORGE S. HOWARD

_Leader of the U.S.A. Air Force Band_

George Sallade Howard, son of Florence and Hayden Howard, was born February 24, 1903, in Reamstown, Pennsylvania. His father had been a soldier in the Spanish-American War and his Grandfather Howard a member of the Union Cavalry during the Civil War. George, the only son, liked to listen to his father’s thrilling war stories, and they had fought over the Spanish-American battles many times.

Although there was much music around the Howard home, young George Sallade Howard, the only child, didn’t want to be a musician. His mother was a professional pianist and Grandfather Sallade who lived with them was a former bandleader and clarinetist. But George would have no lessons from either of them.

But no one needed to tell Grandfather Sallade that George would some day be a great clarinet player, because he _knew_ it. He knew it by the way George listened to music and by the questions he asked about the clarinet. However no one urged the boy to study music until he was ready.

That time came when at the age of fifteen he entered high school and heard the school band. Rushing home the first day, he announced, “I’m going to be in the band, and I want to play the clarinet. Will you teach me, Grandfather?”

His music-loving family knew that home instruction was not always satisfactory, so they sent him to study under a local teacher. He had more questions than ever to ask his grandfather, but it was many years later when George realized how much help and encouragement he had received from him during his school band days.

From high school George went to Ithaca College, Ithaca, New York, having won a three-year music scholarship there. Although his parents were well able to meet his college expenses, George earned all his spending money by playing in the Ithaca Theater Orchestra.

After receiving his degree from Ithaca, George started collecting more sheepskins. He studied at Ohio Wesleyan until he received his A.B. degree, then went on to Chicago Conservatory for his degree of Master of Music. His ambition still unsatisfied, he secured his Master’s degree at New York University and returned to Chicago Conservatory for his doctorate of music.

With all this extensive preparation and an armful of degrees, George Howard at the age of nineteen, began his career in Patrick Conway’s famous band. Five years later he was the clarinet soloist, a chair he held for two years.

Then he left the concert field to become an educator in the music field. He was asked to return to his first college, Ithaca, this time to teach clarinet and saxophone. From Ithaca he went to the second college he had attended, Ohio Wesleyan University, as instructor of wind pedagogy.

As George Howard’s reputation as a leader and teacher spread, he was in great demand. He accepted the job of Director of Music at the widely-known national home for young people maintained by the Moose Lodge in Mooseheart, Illinois. Here the Mooseheart Band under his direction won the Illinois state championship for four consecutive years.

From 1936 to 1942 Howard was Director of Music at Pennsylvania State Teachers College where they proudly tell about his achievements in their music department during that time. Reluctantly they released him “on leave” to the army.

His most satisfying experience came when he was sent to do special service for the United States Army in Greenland, Iceland, Newfoundland, and Labrador in 1942. He was given the rank of Captain and told that his job was to build up the morale of the soldiers stationed there. He traveled alone and found a new use for his talents and training.

To quote his own words, “I had always believed that music exerted a greater influence on people than any other type of culture, and this idea was fully verified when I took up my work on this assignment. There were these lonely men, stationed in isolated places, and with no entertainment during the long, sunless, winter hours. It was a fertile field for music’s spell, but it was very difficult at first to arouse their interest and cooperation.”

However Captain Howard’s wide experience had taught him how to make contact with many types of people. Genial, earnest and dynamic, he soon had an audience. He taught them to play on small, basic musical instruments such as the ukelele, harmonica and tonettes. The tonette is a midget clarinet that was very popular with U. S. troops the world over. He helped organize dance orchestras, military bands, and even “barber shop” quartettes.

“After a while,” continued the Captain, “music melted their hearts. Often six or seven hundred crowded into the room to sing together old songs and to learn new ones. Their faces, formerly dull and unresponsive, showed their pleasure and enjoyment. The talent of some of them surprised me. One soldier in Greenland made one of the finest-toned violins I have ever heard from a few strands of wire, some wood and a little glue.”

After Captain Howard had finished his assignment of setting up musical programs in the North Atlantic Command, he returned to Washington, D. C.

In March, 1944, he transferred from the Army to the Air Force as Commanding Officer and Conductor of the U. S. Air Force Band. He took the band on a tour of Eastern Canada and then overseas to England, Scotland and France.

When this unit was disbanded at the end of the war, Captain Howard had proven his outstanding qualities as a musical director. He was given the rank of major and a new assignment, that of establishing an Air Force Band on a permanent basis.

The Air Force had found in Major Howard the one person who could mold the kind of musical organization they wanted. Here was a young conductor of forty years, a recipient of five degrees in Music, who had a background of twenty years in the field of musical education. With his added experiences and achievements in both Army and Air Force music, Major Howard was a well-known man in the world of music. That made it easier for him to assemble a group of outstanding musicians for the new service band.

In 1949 the rank of Lt. Colonel was bestowed upon the Commandant of the now internationally known U. S. Air Force Band.

Colonel Howard is doing what most people would call a super-human job. When he was asked about his vacation, he said slowly, “Vacation. That is something I dream about.”

Colonel Howard rides horseback when he can. He likes to read fiction or to look at television or listen to his large collection of records in his bachelor apartment in Washington. Redecorating his apartment has grown to be a habit with the Colonel. Recently he has had three side walls painted a vivid dark blue and the fourth side a copper tone. The ceiling is white. The Colonel said, “This sounds startling, but it really isn’t as bad as it sounds.”

Colonel Howard’s medals are quite impressive. Among them are the Legion of Merit and the U. S. Army Commendation Ribbon with five oak leaf clusters.

He is the author of many magazine articles and of _Ten Minute Self-Instructor for Pocket Instruments_. Among his music compositions are: _The Red Feather_ (theme song for Community Chest), _American Doughboy_, _My Missouri_, _Niece of Uncle Sam_, and _General Spaatz March_.

Lt. Colonel George S. Howard, “Chief of Bands and Music and Conductor, U.S.A.F. Band and Orchestra,” has earned the respect and affection of his musicians and of his public.

_Concert Bands_

JOHN PHILIP SOUSA

John Philip and his gang plunged through the weeds and briars along the muddy bank of the Potomac!

“Come on! It’s a band on the avenue!” cried Philip, dashing ahead. “Let’s hurry!”

This was a common occurrence in those exciting days. The War between the States was just beginning, and Washington, D. C., the headquarters of the Union Army, was a thrilling place to be.

The boys were kept busy watching the many activities. They saw officers on horseback galloping importantly in all directions. They saw men working furiously building large frame barracks for the soldiers or huge corrals for the thousands of horses and mules.

And now Philip’s father, Antonio Sousa, had quit his place as trombone player in the Marine Band and joined the Navy to do his part in fighting the war.

Bands were playing everywhere, but Philip was so fond of music he never grew tired of hearing them. He couldn’t keep away from a band or keep his feet from stepping in time when he was near one. Every day Philip Sousa slipped out of the house and attached himself to the first line of blue-clad soldiers he could find. He ran alongside them until he found the band. Sometimes he followed them all day long.

During the next few years the young boy saw many unusual sights. He saw people gay over some battles and sad over others. And then one awful morning Philip awoke to find the streets filled with crowds weeping instead of laughing. He saw the Capital city draped in black and all the flags hanging down low. When he asked about this, he was told that the flags were at half-mast because President Lincoln had been shot.

It was at Lincoln’s funeral that Philip first realized how sad music could be. The mournful sound of the muffled drums and the solemn, minor strains of music played by the bands marching in the procession, touched his young heart.

But the war scene that made the deepest impression upon Philip was the grand parade of the victorious armies. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers and countless bands marched in a procession so long that it took two days to pass the White House. Young as he was, the boy made up his mind that some day he would lead a marching band like these.

The war was ended. Antonio Sousa had come home and returned to his place in the Marine Band. The family went back to their normal way of living.

Antonio Sousa was of Portuguese parentage although he had been born in Spain. When a young man he had come to America, to New York City. He met and married Elizabeth Trinkhaus from Bavaria, who was visiting relatives in Brooklyn. The young couple went to live in Washington, D. C., and in a small brick house at 617 G Street, S.E. John Philip Sousa had been born. There he grew to manhood “in the shadow of the Capitol,” to use his own words.

The out-of-doors appealed to Philip; he liked to play with other boys and go hunting and fishing with his father. But above everything else the boy loved music. He was happy when he was allowed to visit the nearby Marine Barracks during rehearsals. The bandsmen liked him and often let him play the triangle or the cymbals.

When he was very young, Philip had begun to study the violin with an old Spanish friend of his father. Later he studied in an Academy of Music conducted by a son of his first teacher.

“I overheard the teacher ask my father to send me to his school,” said Sousa. “I was terribly insulted when he said, ‘Even if he doesn’t learn anything it will keep him off the street.’

“Although I neither answered a question asked by the teacher nor spoke a word in school, I learned all he taught. I won all the medals he offered in the examinations.... I have them yet, little gold lyres.”

Philip’s violin teacher found fault with his manner of bowing and they had a fiery argument. Angry and disgusted, the boy decided to give up music. He went to work at night in a bakery. His parents insisted that he continue going to school in the daytime, but he could not carry on such a sleepless, strenuous schedule. He gave up the bakery job and returned to the Academy after his father had made peace with the professor.

Although only thirteen years old, Philip organized his first band--a quadrille band he called it. He played the first violin. Seven men, all much older than he, played respectively: the second violin, viola, bass, clarinet, cornet, trombone and drum. They became quite a famous dance orchestra until young Sousa, urged by the other members asked for an increase in pay. When the manager refused him, Philip quit. The other members played on without a raise, but Sousa had lost his job.

Feeling very blue and despondent, Philip was quite in the mood to accept an offer which came to him just then--to play in a circus band. The job seemed full of gaiety and glamour, but he felt sure that his parents would never give their consent. The circus agent also knew this was true, but he finally won the boy’s promise to keep it a secret and go with the company when it left Washington.

Under the cloak of secrecy the idea grew more appealing, but Philip made the mistake of confiding in his friend who lived next door, swearing him to secrecy. The boy promptly told his mother all about it. _His_ mother, just as promptly, told Philip’s mother. Horror-struck she went to her husband, but Philip’s father wisely said nothing to the boy.

The next day, however, Mr. Sousa and his son went out for a walk. The walk ended at the Navy Yard where, a few hours before, Mr. Sousa had conferred with the Commandant, General Zeilin. As a result John Philip Sousa enlisted in the Marine Band June 9, 1868, as a music apprentice.

This was the beginning of Philip’s training for his real career. He soon became an expert cornetist, but he did not neglect his violin practice. And before long he had begun to compose music.

He made friends rapidly. Among them was the Honorable William Hunter, Assistant Secretary of State. Mr. Hunter, a great lover of music, each week invited a group of young students to his home for a musical evening. He always gave them a bountiful supper and never failed to slip a five-dollar bill into the pocket of his favorite, Philip.

After a few years the Marine Band began to lose its glamour for Sousa. He wanted more independence. Through Mr. Hunter’s influence he was released from the organization. He began to teach the violin, and his classes grew fast. At the same time he took lessons from George Benkert, a fine violinist. By playing first violin in the orchestra at Ford’s Opera House, he was able to pay his way.

Soon Philip, a handsome young fellow of nineteen, accepted a position as an orchestra leader in Chicago. And before long he went to Philadelphia to play first violin in Offenbach’s Orchestra which had come from France to play at the Centennial Celebration. He also played in Mrs. John Drew’s popular theater orchestra. Later he managed and coached a company of society folk in the Gilbert and Sullivan opera, _Pinafore_.

Then young Philip Sousa fell in love with Jennie Bellis, a pretty sixteen-year-old actress in the opera cast. In less than one year they were married and living in a little home in Philadelphia. Three children were born to them throughout the years, two girls and one boy, Helen, Priscilla and Philip Jr.

On October 1, 1880, Sousa was recalled to Washington from Philadelphia to conduct the Marine Band. He took the group of well-trained but disorganized musicians and succeeded in establishing fine cooperation and rare good feeling. _He built the Marine Band into the finest marching band in all America._ “The President’s Own,” as it was called, always played at the White House for social and state affairs.

At 26, Sousa was a man of distinctive appearance with his square-trimmed black beard, gold-rimmed eyeglasses and his always immaculate uniforms. He never failed to put on a pair of clean white kid gloves for each performance. In later years after Sousa had achieved great wealth, he stepped into a large Fifth Avenue store in New York City and nonchalantly ordered twelve hundred pairs of white kid gloves, at five dollars a pair.

Although Sousa conducted with a gracious dignity, he seldom smiled. Yet his audience keenly felt his strong, magnetic personality. He had no affectations or mannerisms but stood still in his place very erect, swinging his arms in precise unison in his own individual fashion. The music seemed to come from his expressive hands.

Sousa was a wonderful showman with a keen sense of spectacular effects. Once when giving an outdoor evening concert, he noticed the lights were turned on gradually. First a tiny speck appeared in the darkness, slowly growing into a glaring blaze of light. That gave him an idea. Sousa had his band begin the opening number, _Nearer My God to Thee_, in a soft, tender pianissimo just as the faint beam of light appeared. The music gradually increased in power as the lights grew brighter, ending in an enormous crescendo as the illumination reached its greatest strength. This was so impressive and pleasing that the audience requested this hymn and the accompanying lighting effects be played throughout the entire season.

The people, not only in the capital city but over the whole United States, were enabled to hear the finest music of the time through John Philip Sousa and the Marine Band. At his request Congress, for the first time, granted permission for the U. S. Marine Band to make concert tours over the country. Those opportunities were appreciated for that was an era when a fine band was a great novelty. Many people gladly traveled long distances to large cities to hear Sousa’s Marine Band.

After twelve years Sousa retired from this great organization. A syndicate of Chicago men asked him to come there and form a band “which would not be excelled by any brass band on earth.” He was offered a huge salary besides a generous interest in the profits. “And in addition,” said Sousa, “they purchased a half interest in all my manuscript compositions and in any others I may write through the next five years. For twelve years, I have been conducting in Washington and my heart is here, but this offer is too good to be refused.”

Sousa had no difficulty in forming his new organization in Chicago. Soloists on the various band instruments and expert bandsmen from all parts of the country, eager to join the famous bandmaster, applied for membership.

Beginning at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1892, this noted concert band traveled all over the United States, playing in every large town and city. They toured many foreign countries and in addition, made one trip around the world, winning the greatest success and honor wherever they appeared. Sousa and his popular band gave command concerts for England’s royalty, and it was a London newspaper man that gave him the title of the “March King.”

Sousa believed that he was inspired to write marches by the influence of the Civil War days during his childhood in Washington. At that time the air was filled with the sound of marching troops and military bands, and this impression had never left him. Sousa is said to have been responsible for the great popularity of marches during the 1890 decade.

_The Stars and Stripes Forever_ came to him during an ocean voyage. Called home by the death of his friend and manager, David Blakesly, he sailed from Naples. He spent hours pacing back and forth on deck, and this music came into his mind and would not leave. When he arrived home, he immediately wrote the composition as he had heard it. This march was published without any change at all, and from its various sources earned Sousa over $300,000.

In World War I Sousa gave up his band and his huge salary to join the Great Lakes Naval Reserve. He became conductor of the Great Lakes Band for which he accepted only one dollar a month. He at once shaved off his luxurious beard--“so the young fellows wouldn’t think me so much older than they.”

The number of enlistments fairly swamped the band quarters. Hundreds flocked to receive instruction from this noted bandmaster. There were so many that Sousa organized a band battalion of 350 with a full quota of officers. The remaining men he put into double battleship units which were assigned to each regiment at the station and to different ships as the Admirals requested. While he was with the Great Lakes Band, Sousa designed a new band instrument--a mellow-toned horn to replace the Helicon tuba with its harsh sound. This Sousaphone is in use in all large bands today.

At the end of the war Sousa reassembled his concert band of eighty-four top-notch players. This was generally acknowledged the finest concert band of all time. He traveled with the group through six months of the year and vacationed the remaining months. For some time Sousa refused to broadcast as he disliked the radio. He said that he missed the direct contact with his audience and the stimulation of its presence and applause. However, when he was seventy-five years old, he accepted the large salary offered him to play weekly broadcasts of one hour each.

Although the world at large knew Sousa as the March King, his more than one hundred marches represent only a small part of his writings. He also composed ten operas, including _El Capitan_, in which De Wolfe Hopper starred. _The Queen of Hearts_, _The Bride Elect_, _Chris and the Wonderful Lamp_, and _The Charlatan_, all big successes in their day. He composed more than twenty suites, forty or fifty songs, and a monumental work for orchestra, organ and choir, including _The Last Crusade_. He wrote three novels: _Pipetown Sandy_, in which he devoted a chapter describing the two-day march of the victorious U. S. Northern army; _The Transit of Venus_; and _The Fifth String_. He was the author of numerous magazine articles, and an illustrated biographical sketch ran serially in the _Saturday Evening Post_ in 1925. His autobiography, _Marching Along_, was published in 1928.

So many sources of income brought Sousa great wealth. He had always liked to ride horseback, play golf, and shoot clay pigeons at the trap. To indulge in these hobbies he bought a large farm--700 acres--in North Carolina. There he also raised game birds--quail, grouse and partridges, as well as dogs and horses. But Sousa really spent most of his free time at his beautiful home at Sands Point on Long Island, New York. There he was happiest when surrounded by his devoted wife and family. There he often entertained his warm friends, among whom were Thomas A. Edison, Victor Herbert, Irving Berlin and Charles Chaplin.

Sousa was seventy-eight years old when he died of a sudden heart attack, March 6, 1932, at Reading, Pennsylvania. He had gone there to lead the Ringgold band on its eightieth anniversary. His body was brought home to Washington, his birthplace, and lay in state in the bandroom of the Marine Barracks, where at the age of thirteen his musical career had begun.

During his funeral the Senators and Representatives of the U. S. Government paused in their proceedings to pay a tribute to John Philip Sousa, whom they called “The world’s greatest composer of march music.”

Sousa is buried in the Congressional Cemetery on a grassy plot, not far from his beloved Capitol.

“Wherever he has gone,” Deems Taylor wrote, “I am sure he has found a welcome. There is a dining hall in the Elysian Fields marked Grade A Composers Only. If you could look in at the door tonight, you would probably see him there; perhaps not at the speakers’ table with Wagner and Beethoven and Mozart and Bach and Debussy and the rest, but somewhere in the room--at a small table, possibly, with Herbert and Strauss and Delibes.

“‘However did _he_ get in here?’ asks some disapproving shade--a small-town Kapellmeister, probably ... ‘Who got _him_ in?’

“The guide smiles, ‘The marching men. The men who had to go long miles, on an empty belly, under a hot sun, or through a driving rain. They made us take him in. They said he made things easier for them.’”

PATRICK SARSFIELD GILMORE

_The Father of the Concert Band_

Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore, America’s first great bandmaster, was born on Christmas Day, 1829, in the village of Ballygar, County Galway, Ireland. His parents hoped that he would go into the priesthood, but that idea did not appeal to Patrick. He loved music more than anything else in the world. Even when a very small boy he had a knack of making his own toys from wood, wire or whatever he could find. Always they were crude musical instruments, fifes, drums or fiddles from which he was able to blow, beat or scrape a bit of a tune.

At fifteen, Patrick having finished the village school, went to work in a mercantile house in the nearby town of Athlone. Several regiments of the British army were stationed in the town, and Patrick could not keep away from their bands. One of the bandmasters, a Mr. Keating, noticed the boy and taught him to play the cornet.

Before long Patrick’s employer discovered that his young clerk was giving more time to music than business. He kindly suggested that the boy teach his own sons what he knew about music. But Pat did not care to teach, he preferred playing. He learned so rapidly that soon Keating gave him a place in a regimental band. Later, when the regiments were sent over to Canada, along went Patrick Gilmore.

When Pat was nineteen, he became tired of the military service. He obtained his release from the British army, and drifted down to Boston which was then the musical center of the United States. Young Gilmore at once found a job in Ordway’s Music Store. This concern which had a band and a minstrel show held his interest for a short time. But Patrick, true to his first love, soon got a place in a band and became known as a skillful cornetist.

It was but a short time until Patrick Gilmore was the leader of the Charleston Band. His second venture in leadership was as the successor of Ned Kendall, the well-known bandmaster of the Suffolk Band. Gilmore’s experience in the army had taught him the value of discipline and practice and with his genial, friendly disposition, he had no trouble in training his bandsmen. His reputation grew as he took over the leadership of the Boston Brigade Band.

About this time a noted French bandleader, Louis Antoine Jullien, arrived in Boston. He had a fine orchestra and used many spectacular effects in his programs. One number which must have made a deep impression on Pat Gilmore was called _The Firemen’s Quadrille_. In this, fireworks were displayed and a company of firemen appeared drenching the aisles with water from the hose.

Gilmore gave up the Boston Brigade to accept an offer from the Salem Band at “$1,000 a year and all he could make.” After two successful years he returned to Boston where he organized his first band. Gilmore was then twenty-nine years old. Handsome, high-spirited and even-tempered, he made many friends. He was popular in various circles, especially among newspaper publishers, merchants and politicians. Pat never believed in hiding his accomplishments; he used every possible means of advertising himself and his band. He took his organization to the Charleston Convention, in 1860, and to the Lincoln Convention in Chicago’s Wigwam.

When the Civil War came on, Gilmore and his band enlisted in a body in the 24th Massachusetts Volunteers. Governor Andrews named Gilmore Bandmaster-General and Chief Musician of the State of Massachusetts. The regiment was sent to North Carolina, and later to New Orleans where Gilmore was put in charge of all the military bands in the Department of the Gulf.

In 1864, at a huge celebration in honor of the inauguration of the Honorable Michael Hahn as Governor of the Union State of Louisiana, Gilmore staged a spectacular concert. He assembled a chorus of 5,000 school children, a band of 500 pieces, a huge fife and drum corps, with cannon and bells coming in to accent the climaxes. _Hail Columbia_, _Star-Spangled Banner_, _America_ and other patriotic choruses were sung. Bandmaster Gilmore scored a great success. He returned home filled with ambition and eager for new worlds to conquer.

Back in Boston he organized a new band, and made a tour of the country, reaping more honors for himself and his new organization. Then Patrick Sarsfield Gilmore conceived the great idea which carried him to the peak of his career. In June, 1867, he told his wife after asking her to keep the matter secret, “I’m going to get up the greatest musical festival and the grandest celebration in the world. It is to be a National Jubilee to celebrate the Coming of Peace throughout the land. It will be held in a great coliseum that will be built to hold 50,000 people.... The excitement over all the country will be tremendous and everybody will rejoice at the idea.”

Gilmore went to work at once on his great project. Boston people thought he was crazy. Neither New York nor Washington would have anything to do with such a wild scheme. Failing to get any city to undertake the plan, he determined to do it himself. With his winning Irish ways Gilmore talked to millionaire bankers, conservative music leaders, doctors, lawyers and merchants, everyone of influence whose interest he desired. And he won their cooperation in almost every case. Julius Eichberg, the director of the staid Boston Conservatory of Music, agreed to conduct the chorus of 20,000 school children. Carl Zerrahn, Boston’s top orchestra leader, promised to direct the mammoth orchestra in several great works. Singing societies from far and near accepted invitations to join the grand chorus of 10,000 voices. They wrote for programs and soon the choral numbers were being practiced in countless towns and cities, all getting ready for the great event.

Gilmore, producer or projector, as many spoke of him, personally carried out his gigantic plans, and neither his powerful energy nor his smiling good humor ever failed him. He wrote hundreds of letters and signed each one. “Praying that the grace of God be with the undertaking and direct it to a successful end.” Although there were great numbers of objectors and opponents to the stupendous scheme, Gilmore, undaunted, worked cheerfully on. Many hundreds of people gave money and help to the happy, confident originator of the plan.

The date was set, June 15, 16, 17, 1869. The immense auditorium, 500 feet long, 300 feet wide and 100 feet high, was erected in St. James Park,--now the site of the Copley-Plaza Hotel. Thousands objected to the huge coliseum, saying that it would be unsafe for a great crowd. Parents protested against the 20,000 children’s chorus singing in the new untried structure. The school board reported this to Gilmore who cleverly suggested that the children sing on the _final_ instead of the _first_ day, after the building had been tested by the crowds at the earlier programs. The school board consented to this.

The coming great Peace Jubilee was the talk of the whole country. Crowds were coming from great distances as well as nearby. Gilmore had won the consent of the railroad companies to sell half-fare train tickets to all visitors. The newspapers advertised low-priced rooms and lodgings. All Boston was hysterically excited over the gigantic celebration. When the huge bass drum arrived on a flat car--it was the largest drum ever made in America up to that time--the crowd of curious people completely jammed the railroad station so that no one could get in or out.

In order to keep the thousands of musicians together in the performance, Gilmore had speaking tubes attached to his music stand through which he gave orders to his various assistant leaders throughout the band and chorus. Beside these tubes were telegraph keys to control the electrified cannon out in the park.

Finally all the arrangements were completed. Gilmore, returning home at midnight June 14, told his wife, “When I even think of tomorrow I can find no words to express my feelings.” Mrs. Gilmore gave him this cheery reply. “... Only two things will afterwards be spoken of as wonderful and miraculous--one is the Creation, the other, your Peace Jubilee.”

At three o’clock on the afternoon of June 15, the doors of the great auditorium were closed. The vast audience, thousands upon thousands, filled the great building from the floor to the roof. The singers, ten thousand of them, were seated on the stage. The one thousand men in the orchestra sat in their places with every instrument tuned in readiness.

The aged Edward Everett Hale offered the opening prayer. After the mayor’s too lengthy address which very few could hear, the concert master, Carl Rosa came on the stage to join the orchestra. Following him, amid great applause came the world’s most noted violinist, Ole Bull, to be the first violin in the orchestra.

Gilmore entered last, wildly cheered. He mounted the high stand. Bowing to the audience his voice trembled with emotion as he uttered a few words of welcome, ending with, “To One alone, the Omnipotent God, all honor, all glory and all praise are due.” He was a striking figure, tall and slender. His face, framed in his black sideburns and distinctive goatee, was pale from excitement. Large, star-shaped, gold studs glittered in the snowy shirtfront of his immaculate costume. Every eye was fixed upon the graceful erect leader. With his hands held straight before him his baton in his right, suddenly the baton was lifted high, then in a forceful swoop, signalled the opening down beat. Band, organ, chorus, all burst forth together in an ecstasy of harmony in the grand old hymn, _A Mighty Fortress Is Our God_.

The entire audience went wild and their applause lasted for an unbelievable time. Gilmore, trembling and shaken, although filled with triumph, bowed and hurried from the stage.

The program proceeded in its regular order. Julius Eichberg took his place on the stand to conduct Wagner’s _Tannhäuser_ by the band.

The most spectacular number, _The Anvil Chorus_ from Verdi’s _Il Trovatore_, had to be repeated at every day’s program by the request of the audience. No one present could ever forget the parade of the Boston Firemen down the aisle to the stage.

When the time came for _The Anvil Chorus_ which Gilmore always directed, he whistled through the tubes, snapped down his upraised hands, and every instrument instantly woke into sound. The clanging anvils shot flaming sparks as the firemen struck their rhythmic blows. At the grand climax the telegraph keys let loose the ear-shattering blasts of the cannon in a magnificent fortissimo. (Gilmore was the first bandleader to fire a cannon by electricity.)

The vast audience was completely carried away by the marvelous voice of the singer, Parepa-Rosa. She created a tremendous sensation by her singing of the _Star-Spangled Banner_. Dressed in glistening white silk with large buttons of red, white and blue, and diamonds sparkling in her dark hair, she was magnificent. The newspapers gave her great praise. “... Her voice ringing like a trumpet-call above the noise of a thousand instruments, ten thousand voices, the roaring organ, the big drum and the artillery.”

The whole program was a superb success, but the great soprano, Parepa-Rosa, the spectacular arrangement of _The Anvil Chorus_, and Patrick Gilmore himself, were the outstanding features of the festival.

To everyone’s surprise this huge music festival made a profit, a comparatively small sum, but when added to the proceeds of a benefit concert given for Gilmore, almost $40,000 was presented to him. That he had fairly earned this reward everybody agreed. He immediately went to Europe for a rest, he said, but later it was learned that he had spent much time making contacts with great bands for a bigger and a better Jubilee.

Gilmore who was now acknowledged the country’s greatest bandleader, returned from Europe all agog over another great musical Festival. The siege of Paris and the Franco-Prussian War had ended, so he decided to produce an International Peace Jubilee in Boston. He planned to double the chorus--20,000 instead of 10,000 singers, a band of 2,000 instead of 1,000; and a festival lasting three weeks instead of three days.

His preparations were soon under way. Another enormous auditorium--the first one had burned--and a larger organ were constructed. A bigger drum than at the previous festival was built in Portland, Maine. The heads were 12 feet across and the sides 4 feet high. It was so big that a wall had to be knocked out of the house where it was made in order to get it outside. It was shipped to Boston on an ocean steamer, but only a giant could have struck both sides at once and its thunderous sound was so slow in coming after the beat that it was useless. The World’s Peace Jubilee and International Music Festival was announced for June 17 to July 4, 1872. A whole regiment of soloists was engaged, and Johann Strauss came from Germany to personally conduct the huge orchestra in playing his beautiful _Blue Danube Waltz_. As the high point in the international Music Festival, Gilmore brought the greatest of Europe’s noted bands. The Grenadier Guards from London, from Paris the Garde Republicaine, The Kaiser Franz Grenadier Regiment Band from Berlin and also from that city, The German Emperor’s Imperial Household Cornet Quartette. The Irish National Band came from Dublin and the United States Marine Band from Washington, D. C.

However, in spite of the world’s most glamorous talent, the second great festival was a flat failure. The crowds would not come. One day there were 22,000 performers on the stage and only 7,000 people in the audience. Although _The Anvil Chorus_ was again on the program and also the _Soldiers’ Chorus_ given with red fire and many other embellishments, yet the people stayed away. No one blamed Gilmore, _the unsurpassable_, as he was called. He had done his part and produced every attraction which he had advertised.

Gilmore left Boston almost immediately for New York City. He was then forty-four years old, still fired with ambition and a desire to produce huge, perfect, spectacular performances. His band of one hundred players, always the most talented to be found, was in great demand.

In that year, 1873, Gilmore gave his last “big show,” this year in Chicago. It was a series of grand concerts celebrating the restoration of the city after the great fire. The programs were held in the huge concourse of the new passenger station of the Lake Shore Railroad, a room two blocks long, holding 40,000 people--_and Gilmore filled it_. He added two-hundred musicians to his band, had a chorus of 1,000 singers and to the delight of the audience he again played _The Anvil Chorus_ with firemen, anvils, cannon and bells.

The Gilmore Band in 1875 played at Gilmore’s Gardens in New York City making the unusual record of one-hundred-fifty consecutive concerts to crowded houses. A highlight on the last concert of the season was a cornet quartette by the four greatest cornetists of that time--Arbuckle, Bent, Levy and Gilmore. In 1876 Gilmore and his band starred at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.

For thirteen successive summer seasons the Gilmore Band played at New York’s popular Manhattan Beach resort. Gilmore and his noted organization toured the entire United States repeatedly. He was a marvelous organizer, a superfine showman and a good financier and business manager.

As a composer he did not rate high. He is generally given credit for having written the well-known song _When Johnny Comes Marching Home_, although many believed that he was not the author of the composition. That Gilmore was versatile and resourceful everyone admits. In 1890 when his band was asked to play at General Sherman’s funeral, Gilmore revised _Marching Through Georgia_, a rather inside-out-version, making an unusual, unknown funeral dirge, yet which many people felt was vaguely familiar.

While playing at the St. Louis Exposition, September 24, 1892, Gilmore died suddenly. His wife and only daughter were with him at the time. John Philip Sousa, Gilmore’s good friend, two days later at the opening concert of his great band at Plainfield, New Jersey, played _The Voice of a Departed Soul_, one of Gilmore’s own compositions. This seemed to be an appropriate musical finale to the life of a man who had gloried in producing dramatic and spectacular effects.

ARTHUR PRYOR

The clear, mellow tones of a trombone, playing _Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep_, stilled the noisy crowd until a whisper could be heard. Until that moment no one had paid any attention to the Pryor Band which was serenading General “Black Jack” Logan at the encampment of the Grand Army of the Republic at Denver, Colorado, in 1883.

At the close of the solo General Logan hurried out of the meeting to speak to the bandleader, D. S. Pryor. “Who played that trombone? I want to talk to him.”

Removing his bearskin cap, Maestro Pryor proudly said that it was his son Arthur.

“It is God’s gift, and your son has a great future,” said General Logan. Laying his hand on the bushy locks of the bashful twelve-year-old Arthur, the General advised him, “Make the best use of the divine gift you have, boy.”

This incident made such an impression on Arthur’s father that he decided to give his son a more thorough musical training. He secured a Professor Plato, a renowned harmonist and theorist, to teach him.

Arthur Pryor, born September 22, 1870, in St. Joseph, Missouri, was destined to become a musical prodigy. It was in his blood. Back through the generations in his family ran the musical strain, an unfaltering line. His father, Daniel Pryor, was leader of Pryor’s band and “played all instruments.” His mother was a gifted pianist.

At the age of three Arthur beat the drums with such rhythm and skill that the neighbors in admiration forgot to complain about the noise. At six he was playing the piano. Later he did remarkably well on the cornet, alto horn and bass viol.

When Arthur was eleven he played the valve trombone and made his first appearance in Chicago, Illinois, where he was called “the boy wonder.” Soon the lad and his trombone were in great demand in his part of the country, with or without his father’s band.

Arthur reached another milestone at seventeen when his father gave him a slide trombone which he had accepted in payment of a debt. He devoted endless hours to its study under his father’s teaching, and progressed fast.

In later years, Arthur often laughed about his father, a strict teacher, rapping him on the head with a violin bow when he was slow in these lessons. That punishment was stopped after Mr. Pryor had done great damage to a 100 dollar bow.

But the boy did so well that he had a succession of acclaimed appearances at county fairs and other public gatherings in his part of the country. He soon attracted the attention of Liberati, noted cornet soloist of the time, who hired him for his band at Kansas City, Missouri. Arthur was with Liberati from 1888 till 1890.

The twenty-year-old trombonist was engaged for Patrick Gilmore’s band, but instead he accepted the conductorship of the Stanley Opera Company, going to Denver, Colorado.

Then he received his big chance. The great Sousa had heard stories about “a trombone wizard” from the Middle West and sent for him to join him at once. Arthur headed East with a trombone, a ticket to New York, thirty-five cents in cash and a determination to become a “great” in the musical world.

The first night in New York he slept on a bench in Union Square. But the next day at Sousa’s rehearsal the tall, red-haired young man, wearing clothes that badly needed pressing, astounded the veteran bandsmen by his unusual mastery of the trombone.

Pryor became Sousa’s first trombone player in 1892, and the next year played first solo with him at the Chicago Exposition. From premiere soloist he went on to be Sousa’s assistant conductor also. A warm friendship developed between the two musicians, and they traveled together on three world tours in sixteen countries.

An episode that shows Pryor’s trombone magic happened at a concert at the Enclosed Garden in Berlin. Trombonists of six German regiments were there especially to hear him. Pryor played a selection in which he produced his own bass accompaniment, jumping three or four octaves between notes. The vast audience rose en masse and gave him an unprecedented ovation. After the concert the German trombonists approached a German-speaking member of the band and asked permission to examine the master’s instrument. They spent several minutes looking it over, taking it completely apart in the process. Finally they went away grumbling, “It’s impossible. Just another Yankee trick!”

During these years Pryor was christened “the trombone king” and in Germany he was called “the Paganini of the slide trombone.” He estimated that he had played 10,000 solos while he was with Sousa.

Pryor’s association with Sousa ended in 1902. Samuel D. Pryor had recently died, and Arthur took over the band which his father had started one year before Arthur’s birth. With the reorganized band, now made up of some of America’s most talented musicians, Arthur Pryor appeared at the Majestic Theater in New York on November 15, 1903, for his band’s premiere concert.

For the next thirty years Pryor’s band was an internationally known American institution. Critics were lavish in their praise of this group’s simple but original and telling melody. The Pryor organization played at Asbury Park, New Jersey, for nineteen successive summers. From 1904 to 1909 it made six coast-to-coast tours; and for ten straight winters up to 1926, it played at the Royal Palm Park in Miami, Florida. It appeared for ten spring seasons at Willow Grove Park, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and at expositions, state fairs and many public conventions.

Besides, Pryor led his band in various theater and radio engagements, the latter sponsored by General Motors, General Electric, Goodyear Tire and other companies. One popular broadcast, known as the _Schradertown Band_ carried two comics, Gus and Louis, so-called proprietors of the Schradertown Garage.

Pryor was very active in making recordings, notably for the Victor Company. For thirty-one years he was organizer and director of various bands and orchestras making Victor records.

Arthur Pryor was the author of more than 300 compositions, including three light operas, _Jingaboo_, _On the Eve of Her Wedding Day_, and _Uncle Tom’s Cabin_. Originality, beauty of melody and exceptionally fine and effective arrangements characterize his compositions, many of which were sung, whistled and played over the whole country. _On Jersey Shore_ was a great favorite, particularly with his New Jersey audiences who rose to a man when it was played. _Razzazza Mazzazza_, _Irish King_, _Goody Two Shoes_, and _Southern Hospitality_ were always encore winners. But _The Whistler and His Dog_, a novelty two-step became a craze everywhere. Audiences demanded it, and whistled it and kept time with their feet to the lively, catchy tune.