The United States Navy Band is proud to announce our latest recording project, World Class Marches. This project includes marches that are some of our former leader, Captain Ralph M. Gambone's, favorites. These marches, from the United States and around the world, are available only online. We hope to entertain and inspire young and old alike with these exceptional marches.

Music possessing a strong, regular beat and simple style has accompanied armies marching to war throughout history. Used to help troops march in step as well as to raise their spirits, martial music has established deep roots in many cultures. The explosive growth of popular music during the mid-19th century, as well as substantial technical improvements in wind instrument design, strongly impacted military band music. Better trained military musicians began to compose higher quality marches, which in turn received increased performances and established new prominence in the public mind. The subsequent growth in the popularity of the concert band during the latter decades of the century allowed the march to transcend its traditional military confines and find a new home and greater popularity in the community wind band. Most of today's familiar march favorites were composed in this "Golden Age" of band music between the early 1880s and the start of the World War I.

Because many march tunes were composed to inspire or instill patriotic emotions among their nation's citizenry, march styles have, in many cases, acquired a distinctly national flavor. Examples here include Austrian military bandmaster Josef Franz Wagner's Under the Double Eagle (op. 159 - 1899), saluting the Austro-Hungarian Empire's coat of arms; and Zacatecas, by Genaro Codina, who originally wrote the tune in 1893 for harp in honor of Zacatecas' state governor, a Mexican Army general. It has since become the national march of Mexico. Teófilo de Magalhães originally composed Cançáo do Exército as the "Dobrado Capitão Cassulo" (Captain Cassulo March). After later receiving a lyric by Brazilian Army officer LTC Alberto Augusto Martins, it became known as "Canção do Soldado" or "Soldier's Song." Today the march is referred to by its official title, Cançáo do Exército and serves as the official march of the Brazilian Army.

A uniquely American contribution to the genre is the circus march. Typically very fast and exciting in character, they feature exuberant melodies and virtuosic woodwind lines. As the name implies, they are intended to evoke images of all the thrills and excitement of a big top circus. Two examples featured here are In Storm and Sunshine and Belford's Carnival March. "In Storm and Sunshine" (1885), one of the most enduring circus marches, was written by John Clifford Heed (1862-1908). Heed was a gifted young cornetist and bandmaster from Hackettstown, New Jersey. Composed when he was only 23, it is uncertain whether "In Storm and Sunshine" was created specifically for a circus, but has none the less established itself as a circus favorite and stands as the best known of Heed's 60 marches. Virtuoso euphonium player Russell Alexander (1877-1915) joined the Belford's Carnival circus band at age 18, staying only two short years before moving on to the euphonium position in the Barnum and Bailey Circus band. Composed in 1897 at the end of his tenure with the carnival, the "Belford's Carnival March" has remained a staple of the circus march repertory.

Marches have often taken their themes and inspiration from music of other genres. Roland Seitz (1867-1946) penned March Grandioso in 1909 with its principal theme derived from Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 14. Seitz lived in southeastern Pennsylvania and played euphonium in his local community band. He was a gifted all-around musician who played, taught and composed for a variety of instruments. He also earned his living as a printer, providing him with the unique opportunity to publish many of his own compositions.

The march, however, achieved its most developed state in the form of the "concert march." Stylized to incorporate aspects and techniques of opera and romantic orchestral music, the concert march was not intended to serve as functional music (like its martial predecessors), but rather to act as a stand-alone musical creation. Eventually, composers in other genres adopted the march style, incorporating it into symphonic movements and diverse musical forms of every kind. The concert march offered here was originally titled "La Rosa di Toscana." Political pressure forced its Czech composer, Julius Fucik (1872-1916), to rename it the Florentiner March (op. 214). Fucik was a bassoonist under J. F. Wagner in an Austro-Hungarian regimental band before later receiving his own regimental bandmaster appointment. The "Florentiner March" is operatic in style. The composer subtitled the work "Grande Marcia Italiana" and penned it as his tribute to Florence and the region of Tuscany.

1.	Under the Double Eagle March 128K (2.43 Mb) - 256K (4.86 Mb)	Joseph Wagner	2:39
2.	Zacatecas March 128K (3.91 Mb) - 256K (7.83 Mb)	Genaro Codina arranged by L.P. Laurendeau	4:16
3.	Cançáo do Exército 128K (3.46 Mb) - 256K (6.93 Mb)	Teófilo de Magalhães arranged by F. Salutari and LCDR Maurice Ford	3:47
4.	In Storm and Sunshine March 128K (2.78 Mb) - 256K (5.56 Mb)	J.C. Heed	3:02
5.	Belford's Carnival March 128K (1.81 Mb) - 256K (3.64 Mb)	Russell Alexander	1:59
6.	March Grandioso 128K (2.43 Mb) - 256K (4.88 Mb)	Roland Seitz	2:39
7.	Florentiner March 128K (5.36 Mb) - 256K (10.7 Mb)	Julius Fucik	5:51

*Note: Each march has two versions on the website - 128K for slower connections, and 256K for faster connections.

Roster/credits