John Philip Sousa Essentials

The “March King” John Philip Sousa was steeped in military music from an early age. In 1865, aged just 10, Sousa joined the crowds in Washington DC to watch the parades celebrating the end of the Civil War. The band music played that day were to set him on his path—thereafter, guided initially by his trombone-playing father, Sousa devoted much of his life to performing and composing music for marching bands. This playlist features some of Sousa’s greatest marches, including Stars and Stripes Forever with its unforgettable piccolo descant, and Liberty Bell, famously used as the theme tune for the 1960s and ’70s UK comedy series Monty Python’s Flying Circus. But there are so many more Sousa gems to stir the soul, including 1926’s rousing The Pride of the Wolverines, and the endearingly circus-like Easter Monday on the White House Lawn, composed in 1911 as a tribute to the traditional “egg roll” party hosted annually by American presidents and their families.