After receiving his commission in the US Navy, John Philip Sousa set to work with his 300 piece “Jackie” Band taking them around the country on tours to raise money for the war effort.
Here Sousa conducts the band at a Liberty Loan Campaign in in Cincinnati, Ohio, 1918. Note the chairs being used as music stands in the trombone section and the buglers seated around the band no doubt waiting to play The Thunderer or Semper Fidelis!
Being a rabid baseball fan, Sousa must have enjoyed playing in front the A.G. Spalding and Bros. store!
What is fascinating is that the “buglers” are all playing Model 1892 field trumpets in G with a turning slide that puts them in the key of F, thus allowing them to play marches that begin in Bb that switch to F in the Trio. It is my understanding that Sousa wrote “Anchor and Star” especially for the Bluejacket Band because the Navy School of Music had so many buglers in it that I imagine that they had possibly begged Sousa to write a march for the Navy featuring field trumpets such as he had done for the Marine Corps with “Semper Fidelis.”
Indeed, in the Trio, there is possibly an “inside joke” Sousa inserted in the field trumpet part where he has them play the rhythm (though not the melody) of the section of the bugle march “You’re In the Army Now” that goes “You’ll never get rich, you son of a bitch, you’re in the Army now.” It is possible that in 1918, the march was known under different titles by different services. But the buglers all knew it.
Dear Mr. Goodman,
Thank you ever so much for your insight and expertise in this matter! Any and all contributions help in adding to the Sousa story making the portrait more complete.
Appreciatively,
Barry Owen Furrer