March
(Fr.
marche; Ger. Marsch; It. marcia).
Music
with strong repetitive rhythms and an uncomplicated style usually used to
accompany orderly military movements and processions. Since the 16th century,
functional march music has existed alongside stylized representations of the
march, which were often incorporated for programmatic purposes into art music.
The distinction between the functional and the stylized march is often blurred,
however: in the 18th century, functional marches were frequently imported
virtually unchanged into wind-band music, often forming integral movements of
serenades or divertimentos. During the 19th century, the functional military
march declined, and the stylized march became popular in its own right,
reaching its height in the works of the later Romantic composers. After World
War I, the idea of using an orchestral or choral march as a vehicle for paying
homage to rulers and celebrating nations and ideals, which had prevailed since
the time of Lully, fell into decline, and the march came to be seen principally
as an art-music genre.
1. The military march
to the 1820s.
2. 19th- and
20th-century military and popular marches.
3. The march in art
music.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
ERICH SCHWANDT (1, 3), ANDREW LAMB
(2)
March
1. The military march to the 1820s.
As
early as Virgil’s Aeneid the sound of instruments was acknowledged as a
means of exciting ardour in advancing armies. In the early 16th century
European nations had their peculiar drum-calls (see Signal
(i)), which were held to be
insignia as significant as the blazonry on their standards. The Swabian
infantry of the Emperor Maximilian was recognized by the sound of its
characteristic marching rhythm (ex.1), while both the French and English infantry used a longer
pattern (ex.2); Arbeau (Orchésographie, 1588)
credited the Swiss with yet another characteristic rhythm (ex.3). A warrant of 1632 by
Charles I of England confirmed the earlier registration (1610) of the English
national drum march:
Whereas
the ancient custome of nations hath ever bene to use one certaine and constant
forme of March in the warres, whereby to be distinguished one from another … It
pleased our late deare brother Prince Henry to revive and rectifie the same by
ordayning an establishment of one certaine measure, which was beaten in his
presence at Greenwich, anno 1610. In confirmation whereof wee are graciously
pleased … to set down and ordaine … Willing and commanding all drummers within
our kingdome of England and principalitie of Wales exactly and precisely to
observe the same, as well in this our kingdome, as abroad in the service of any
forraigne prince or state.
Arbeau’s
detailed account of French drum rhythms includes a description of marches in
triple metre (ex.4),
examples of possible variants of the basic duple-metre cell, and suggestions
for improvising fife tunes to accompany the marches. He made the point,
however, that the rests in a given drum-call must be observed no matter how
much the beaten part of the unit is modified, lest the army’s orderly
progression fall into disarray from soldiers tripping over one another.
March
music is essentially an ornamentation of a fixed, regular and repeated drum
rhythm. Stylistic traits of the march that seem to be present throughout its
history include rhythmic patterns with regularly recurring accents built into
phrases or periods, straightforward harmonies and textures, and unpretentious
but often memorable melodies. The usually triadic melodic style and apparent
preference for major keys of most march music may reflect to some extent the
technical limitations of the wind instruments for which marches were written,
many of which were confined to the notes of the harmonic series until well into
the 19th century (see Military calls). As Arbeau’s description shows, duple
and triple metres were both common, though the most frequent time signatures
were , , 2/4 and 6/8. In the 17th and 18th centuries 3/4, 6/4 and 3/2 were
often used as well.
Throughout
its history the tempo of the military march has depended on its particular
function. The slow march (Fr. pas ordinaire; Ger. Parademarsch)
is the ordinary march, the standard against which the tempos of the others are
measured. Used for exercises, reviews and parades, its tempo has varied from
crotchet = 60 to crotchet = 80 at different times and places. The quick march
(Fr. pas redoublé; Ger. Geschwindmarsch), used for manoeuvring,
is approximately twice as fast as the slow march, with a tempo ranging from
crotchet = 100 to crotchet = 140 (116–20 is considered the norm), depending
usually on regimental demands. The double-quick march (Fr. pas de charge;
Ger. Sturmmarsch) is an attack march, still more rapid in tempo.
The
earliest extant marches composed expressly for military use are those of Lully and
André Philidor l’aîné; they include a large selection of pieces entitled
marche, batterie and sonnerie composed for and used by the
various bands of Louis XIV. As first collected by Philidor in 1705, the march
repertory of 17th-century France included marches for drums alone, timpani
alone and trumpet alone, and for Louis’ fife-and-drum band and oboe-and-drum
band, written in a variety of time signatures (, 2, 3/2 and 3). A typical march
for the oboe band is Philidor's La retraite (ex.5), which consists of two eight-bar
strains. The batterie, which is written out separately, uses a great
variety of note values, and introduces many variations within each two-bar
rhythmic cell. Not all French military marches were so regular, however. La
générale, composed by Lully for the oboe-and-drum band and later used by
the Garde Française, is in triple metre and consists of two seven-bar strains (ex.6).
Military
marches of the 17th and 18th centuries were generally ephemeral, functional
pieces composed by bandmasters when required or adapted for military use from
popular tunes, operas and oratorios. By the mid-18th century Rousseau
complained that French marches were ‘tres malfaites’; he thought contemporary
German marches like Der alte Dessauer (composed c1705), Hohenfriedberger
(1745) and Coburger (c1750) much superior and more likely to
encourage military efficiency. The practice of adapting popular tunes to
military purposes seems to have been particularly common in Britain, where most
of the military music in such printed collections as Sprightly Companion
(1695, ed. Playford), Musica bellicosa (1733), Musica curiosa (c1745)
and Warlike Musick (c1760) seems to have come from the popular
operas and oratorios of composers from elsewhere, such as Handel, Jommelli,
Graun, Traetta and Monsigny. British regimental commanders were responsible for
providing music for their troops from their own private ‘band funds’, and it
seems that the principal requirement of an 18th-century regimental march was
the favour of the commander.
The
French Revolution and, in particular, the Napoleonic wars that soon followed
lent new impetus to the composition of marches specifically for particular
regiments and armies, allowing composers to express partisan sentiments while
earning some financial rewards for their efforts. In France certain composers
specialized in the composition of patriotic marches, such men as J.-P.-G.
Martini, François Devienne, Joseph Lefebvre, C.-S. Catel, and M.J. and F.R.
Gebauer, and many more wide-ranging composers, like Gossec, Grétry, Le Sueur, Méhul
and Cherubini, contributed marches used by the French armies. C.J. Rouget de
Lisle’s Marseillaise is probably the most famous surviving march of this
period, first written under the title Chant de guerre pour l’armée du Rhin.
British troops marched to music composed for them by such native composers as
Thomas Busby, John Callcott, William Crotch, James Hook, John Mahon and
Alexander Reinagle, as well as to marches by Handel and Haydn; various Austrian
regiments had marches composed for them by F.X. Süssmayr, Ferdinando Paer,
Hummel and Beethoven. Haydn’s marches (h VIII:1–4 and
6–7), most of which are in E
, are scored for pairs of clarinets, bassoons and
horns, with trumpet, serpent and improvised percussion parts. Only one has a
trio, and all are concise, scarcely exceeding 30 bars in length. Like marches
generally they consist of two strains, and most begin with an upbeat,
frequently a dotted-note figure. Beethoven wrote many pieces for military band
(Harmoniemusik, Militärmusik), often intended for specific
regiments (e.g. WoO19 and 24), and including a polonaise, an écossaise and
several examples of the Tattoo, as well as pieces entitled Marsch
or marcia. All are scored for various wind instruments and percussion,
some of them including the characteristic ‘Turkish music’ instruments: bass
drum, side drum, cymbals and triangle (see Janissary music). All Beethoven’s functional
marches are written in a simple homophonic style, usually in phrases two or
four bars long, and many of them emphasize repeated notes and double-dotted
figures. Two (WoO20 and 24) have trios in contrasting keys, a structure that
became the norm for 19th-century marches.
March
2. 19th- and 20th-century military and popular marches.
Most
of the military marches that have survived from the early 19th century or
earlier have not done so directly. The Rakoczi March, for example, owes its
continued familiarity as much to the attentions of Berlioz (La damnation de
Faust) and Liszt (Hungarian Rhapsody no.15) as to those of successive
military bandmasters (see §3 below), while Beethoven’s Yorck’scher Marsch
(woo18, 1809) has survived more because of its composer’s
wider fame than for its intrinsic appeal. The tremendous explosion of activity
in popular music during the 19th century, however, affected military band music
and gave marches greater durability. Technical innovations in the construction
and fingering of most wind instruments, especially the brass, and the invention
of the saxophone increased both the flexibility and the range of timbres
available in a military band. Band concerts became popular with the general
public, and military schools of music were founded to provide a regular supply
of trained musicians. By the end of the 19th century the size of a standard
military band had grown from a mere handful of musicians at the beginning of
the century to a full complement of 40 to 50 musicians for a typical infantry
band. Thus the opportunities for composers were increased, and marches began to
have more inherent musical interest. Many popular dance conductors and
composers worked as military bandmasters at some point in their careers, and
marches took their place alongside waltzes, galops and polkas in their output.
As in the decades immediately after the French Revolution, many musicians (not
always military bandmasters) concentrated almost exclusively on composing
marches, so that a vast body of them was written in the late 19th century for
ceremonial and military occasions, their titles commemorating regiments,
generals, princes and battles.
The
marches that have survived in the repertory of military bands and light
orchestras date back as far as the middle of the 19th century. The Austrian
Revolution of 1848 was the immediate inspiration for the Radetzky March
of Johann Strauss (i), as the American Civil War was for the Washington
Grays by Claudio S. Grafulla (1810–80). Most of the marches that now form
the basis of the military band repertory were written between 1880 and the
beginning of World War I. Among the continental marches that have remained
popular are Unter dem Doppeladler by J.F. Wagner (1856–1908), Marche
lorraine and Le père la victoire by Louis Ganne (1862–1923), Alte
Kameraden by Carl Teike (1864–1922), and the triumphal march Einzug der
Gladiatoren and Regimentskinder by Julius Fučík (1872–1916).
These marches epitomized the form into which the military march had evolved:
typically, a march was about four minutes long and was written in common time;
the introductory fanfare was followed by an opening section played by the whole
band, usually with a second theme given to trombones, and a trio featuring a
broad lyrical melody.
Above
all, the late 19th century saw the emergence of two march composers who lent
much vitality and originality to the form, the American John Philip Sousa and
the Briton Kenneth J. Alford. Sousa’s Semper fidelis (1888), The
Liberty Bell (1891), King Cotton (1895) and The Stars and Stripes
Forever (1897) are probably the most famous marches he composed for the US
Marine Band and for his own touring band. Their lively, shifting rhythms and
the opportunities they presented for instrumental display made Sousa’s marches
appreciated round the world. Several of them became popular dances as well; The
Washington Post (1889) in particular was associated with the Two-step, and it may have led to the
fashion for two-step marches, which were often used to accompany the Cakewalk. The affinity of march and
dance music led to a sharing of repertories; thus El Abanico, a paso
doble by Alfredo Javaloyes, entered the international band repertory as a
quick march.
By
contrast with the ebullient style of Sousa’s marches, those of the leading
British composer, Kenneth J. Alford, were notable for their clipped melodic
phrases, economy of instrumentation and an unusually wide range of moods. His Colonel
Bogey (1914), On the Quarter Deck (1917) and The Voice of the
Guns (1917) are among the most frequently played of all British marches.
While the consistently high quality of all the marches by Sousa and Alford set
them apart from their contemporaries, many individual marches by otherwise
undistinguished composers attained national or international popularity. Some
of the composers of well-known marches from the late 19th or early 20th century
include E.E. Bagley (1857–1922, National Emblem), Thomas Bidgood
(1858–1925, Sons of the Brave), H.L. Blankenburg (1878–1956, Auszug
der Gladiatoren), Franz von Blon (1861–1945, Unter dem Siegesbanner),
Isaac Dunayevsky (1900–55, Tsirk), E.F. Goldman (1878–1956, On the
Mall), Richard Henrion (1854–1940, Fehrbelliner Reitermarsch), Abe
Holzmann (1874–1939, Blaze Away!), Karl L. King
(1891–1971, Barnum and Bailey’s Favorite), J.N. Klohr (1869–1956, The
Billboard), František Kmoch (1848–1912, Česká muzika), Karl
Komzák (1850–1905, Vindobona Marsch), Gabriel Parès (1860–1934, Le
voltigeur), Gottfried Piefke (1815–84, Preussens Gloria), the
Swedish composer S.H. Rydberg (1885–1956), Wilhelm Zehle (1876–1956, Viscount
Nelson) and C.M. Ziehrer (1843–1922, Freiherr von Schönfeld-Marsch).
After
World War I the role of the infantry regiment declined. Although bandmasters
continued to compose marches that remain in the military band repertory, new
forms of entertainment reduced both the importance of military bands and the
impact of these new marches on the public. Often marches have been adapted from
current popular song, as in Rauski’s Le régiment de Sambre et Meuse,
based on a song by Robert Planquette, or from themes from operettas, as in
Sousa’s El capitán (1896) and Paul Lincke’s Berliner Luft (1899),
much as 18th-century marches were adapted from popular operas. Many other
marches have entered the military band repertory from successful film and
television scores, such as Richard Rodgers’s Guadalcanal (from Victory
at Sea), Eric Coates’s The Dam Busters and Ron Goodwin’s 633
Squadron.
March
3. The march in art music.
Marches
in art music range widely from true functional marches to stylized
representations. As functional pieces, especially in stage or programmatic
works, they may serve to accompany dramatic entrances, parades, coronations,
victories, rejoicing, festivities, triumphs, acts of homage, weddings,
religious acts, funerals or military events. As an integral section of a larger
work, a march may greatly contribute to the total effect. Many functional
marches were composed to stand alone as independent pieces; others were later
extracted from their original contexts.
The
march seems to have entered the mainstream of art music through the opera and
ballet of 17th-century France. Lully introduced marches as entrance music for
single characters accompanied by their ‘troops’, and as accompaniments to
processions, so that marches came to have heroic, sacrificial or nuptial
connotations as well as military ones. Processional music was part of Western
drama from the time of the Greek tragedies, when the parodos and exodus
of the chorus were accompanied by singing and playing on the aulos, and the
theatrical march owes as much to that tradition as to military ones.
17th-century theatrical march music allowed considerably more freedom in
structure, phrasing and tempo than did military marches; because such music was
likely to be carefully choreographed, a certain irregularity of phrase length
was permissible, as in ex. 7, where flutes consistently add a
flourish to the regular eight-beat phrases. Many of Lully’s theatrical marches
use the characteristic rhythms of the minuet, gavotte, bourrée and other court
dances.
Processions
accompanied by march-like music remained a common feature of both opera and
oratorio into the 20th century. The origin of the processional march in stage
music can be seen in examples of ‘exotic’ (Turkish and janissary) marches,
beginning with Lully's ‘Marche des turcs’ from Le bourgeois gentilhomme
(1670) and continuing in the works of Destouches, Campra and Rameau. Pieces
such as these, notably by Lully and Rameau (e.g. Les Indes galantes,
1735), are often characterized by the key of G minor, triple and compound duple
metre, frequent repeated notes and simple sequential phrases. Handel’s Scipione
(1726), Saul (1738), Deidamia (1741) and Judas Maccabaeus
(1747) all include marches that have become more widely known than the works in
which they appeared; indeed, the march that opens Scipione (after the
overture) was originally written as a parade slow march for the Grenadier
Guards, and is still used under the title ‘Royal Guards March’. Processional
marches also appear in operas by Gluck (Alceste, 1767; Iphigénie en
Aulide, 1774) and Mozart (priests’ march in Die Zauberflöte, 1791).
The use of percussion instruments (large drums, cymbals, triangles) in examples
such as the Janissaries' march and chorus in Mozart's Die Entführung aus dem
Serail (1782) and in Beethoven's incidental music for Die Ruinen von
Athen (1811) stems from the Viennese alla turca tradition, itself
influenced by military music.
The
development of processional music in stage works in the early 19th century was
influenced by the style of wind music composed during the period of the French
Revolution. Revolutionary fervour led directly to military bands performing on
stage, in works such as Simon Mayr's Zamori (1804) and Meyerbeer's Il
crociato in Egitto (1824), and notably in operas by Spontini and Rossini.
Other stage works with processional marches include operas by Bellini (druids'
march in Norma, 1831), Meyerbeer (Le prophète, 1849), Wagner
(Wedding March in Lohengrin, 1850), Stravinsky (‘Chinese March’ in The
Nightingale, 1914) and Prokofiev (Love for Three Oranges, 1921).
Processional marches outnumber those intended to accompany military movements
on stage or to emphasize military references in the drama, such as Mozart's Idomeneo
(1781), Le nozze di Figaro (1786) and Così fan tutte (1790),
Wagner's Tannhäuser (1845) and Parsifal (1882), and Berg's Wozzeck
(1925). The march also appears in stage music as a duet, often for tenor and
bass; pieces of this type appear in Salieri's Tarare (1787), Spontini's Fernand
Cortez (1809), Rossini's Guillaume Tell (1829), Donizetti's Lucia
di Lammermoor (1835) and Verdi's Don Carlos (1867). Theatrical
marches, again usually processionals quite divorced from military connotations,
are also prominent in incidental music for spoken plays: there are examples by
Mendelssohn (March of the War Priests from Athalie, 1845; Wedding March
from A Midsummer Night's Dream, 1843) and Beethoven (numbers in König
Stephan, 1811, and Tarpeja, 1813).
At
least from the early 16th century, military music inspired the composition of Battle
music
imitating both musical and non-musical sounds of warfare. Janequin’s chanson Escoutez
tous gentilz, thought to have been written about the battle of Marignan in
1515 and including vocal imitations of French trumpet- and drum-calls, is
probably the best-known early example. Byrd’s Battell for harpsichord
(in My Ladye Nevells Booke, 1591) imitates drums, trumpets, fifes,
tabors and timpani in its descriptive sections ‘Marche of Footemen’, ‘Marche of
Horsmen’ and ‘Marche before the Battell’, incorporating examples of both duple-
and triple-metre marches. A vast quantity of programmatic pieces describing
battles was composed up to the end of the 19th century, most of it written
during or just after major wars. Thus, Beethoven’s Wellingtons Sieg
(1813) evoked memories of the Napoleonic campaigns, with sections intended to
depict an English march, a French march (in 6/8) and a Sturmmarsch or
charge; František Kocžwara’s notorious The Battle of Prague: a Favourite
Sonata (c1788) includes a slow march as its introduction and a quick
march labelled ‘Turkish music’ in its description of the siege of Prague during
the Seven Years War.
March
movements, especially in duple metre, were included in much Baroque keyboard
music (e.g. by Purcell and François Couperin) and in ensemble suites, usually
with military connotations, so that there was a contrast with the use of the
march in the theatre simply to accompany processions. Mattheson (1717) stressed
that the march ought always to convey a sense of grandeur and fearlessness,
also adding (1739) that marches should always be played evenly, as though to
facilitate physical marching by soldiers. The musical style of the march
apparently remained simple and straightforward, for many of the miscellaneous
collections of music for amateurs issued in the 18th century included marches,
and marches were almost invariably among the more elementary exercises in
18th-century tutors for harpsichord, violin, flute and so on (e.g. The
Lady’s Banquet … together with Several Opera Airs, Minuets and Marches,
London, c1730; Pas redoublés et de marches arrangées en duo,
Paris, c1780; Preston’s Pocket Companion for the German Flute,
London, c1785). In some cases, military marches that had originally been
adapted from opera and oratorio thus returned to the realm of art music, an
interesting example of the circular transfer of repertory.
Fux,
Michael and Joseph Haydn, Dittersdorf and the Mozarts included march movements
in cassations, divertimentos and serenades. Mozart’s Serenade in D k239, for example, begins with a ‘marcia maestoso’ that, like
his other march movements, is written in an abbreviated sonata form. His
father's Divertimento militare is scored for pairs of ‘Swegglpfeiffen’,
horns, clarino trumpets, a prominent solo drum and strings; its first movement
is a march in which the military group alternates with the strings. The march
also served as a topos in many kinds of music in the Classical and Romantic
eras, as in the first movement of Mozart's ‘Jupiter’ Symphony, the slow
movement of Schubert's ‘Great’ C major Symphony and the first movement of
Dvořák's Serenade in D minor.
March
movements in 19th-century music were usually fairly stylized, but they
continued to be used programmatically. Schubert’s marches for piano (four
hands, d602, 819 and 733) deliberately adhered to the
style of military marches. Schumann introduced marches in several of his
collections of short piano pieces, evoking both the military (‘Soldatenmarsch’
in Album für die Jugend, 1848) and the processional styles (‘Marche des
Davidsbündler contre les Philistins’ in Carnaval, 1833–5). Although the
march was not a common movement in keyboard sonatas, it was often included in
sets of variations (Beethoven, Diabelli Variations op.120). The Rákóczi March,
which evolved during the 19th century in Hungary from a popular march into a
nationalist symbol, was the subject of several sets of piano variations by
Liszt (e.g. Hungarian Rhapsody no.15). Liszt also made piano arrangements of a
number of Schubert's orchestral marches, extending the form beyond Classical
conventions and incorporating material from other marches. Other keyboard
marches, some now better known as military marches for wind instruments,
include two by Smetana (for the Prague student legion and for the National
Guard, 1848), Tchaikovsky's Military March for the Yurevskiy Regiment (1893),
Debussy's Marche écossaise sur un thème populaire (1891), several by
Richard Strauss, notably the two entitled Parade-Marsch (1905), and
Hindemith's in the Suite ‘1922’ (1922). March-like music accompanied
military imagery in some of Schumann's songs (e.g. Die beiden Grenadiere,
Freisinn, both 1840), as it did in the later songs of Wolf (e.g. Fussreise,
Der Tambour, 1888–9) and Mahler (e.g. Revelge, Der
Tambourgesell, 1889–1901).
Specifically
military connotations for the march were even more easily incorporated into
orchestral movements, where the orchestration could be manipulated to imitate
the exact sound as well as the style of a military band. In Haydn’s ‘Military’
Symphony, for example, woodwind, brass and percussion are unusually prominent;
the slow movement of his ‘Drumroll’ Symphony is more explicitly programmatic in
its use of the march, with its alternation of Turkish and Viennese marches,
thought to be a description of a Turkish invasion of Vienna. The fourth
movement of Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique, the ‘Marche au supplice’,
inserts the instruments of a typical 19th-century military band and the usual
march-and-trio form into the context of a traditional symphonic movement to
create colouristic, brilliant and often terrifying effects. Berlioz arranged
the Rákóczi March for orchestra in 1846, with an extended coda (probably
inspired by a battle-painting), and incorporated it into La damnation de
Faust with a dedication to Liszt. Liszt's own brilliant arrangement (with
two trios) appeared in 1871. Independent marches for orchestra gained great
popularity from the 19th century onwards, notable among them Spontini's Grosser
Sieges- und Festmarsch (arranged from his Prussian choral folksongs of
1818), Meyerbeer's Krönungsmarsch for two orchestras (1861, for the
coronation of Wilhelm I of Prussia), Saint-Saëns's Marche héroïque
(1871), Gounod's Marche religieuse (1876), Tchaikovsky's Slavonic
March (1876), Wagner's Kaisermarsch (1871, with male chorus) and Grosser
Festmarsch (1876, for the centenary celebrations in Philadelphia of
American independence), Richard Strauss's two Militärmarsche (1906) and
several brilliant occasional display pieces by Elgar (Imperial March,
1897; five Pomp and Circumstance Marches, 1901–30; Coronation March,
1911) and Walton (Crown Imperial, 1937).
During
the 20th century the march in art music escaped from its formal military
trappings and evolved into a more flexible, less stereotyped genre, as
exemplified in Berg's march in the Three Orchestral Pieces (op.6, 1914–15).
Orchestration became even more colourful: in the ‘Putnam's Camp’ movement of Three
Places in New England (1912) and the ‘Fourth of July’ movement of Holidays
(1911–13), Ives skilfully manipulated the scoring to depict marching bands,
heard within a larger orchestral texture. Elements of parody and caricature
also became common (e.g. Stravinsky, The Soldier's Tale, 1918;
Hindemith, Konzertmusik, 1926; Shostakovich's seventh, eighth and tenth
symphonies, 1941, 1943, 1953).
Of
the many possible non-military uses of march music, the most important category
is probably the funeral march. Early examples of such marches can be found in
Purcell's funeral music for Queen Mary (1694) and in the Tombeau tradition of 18th-century
France, as well as in opera and oratorio, from Lully's ‘Pompe funèbre’ (Alceste,
1674) onwards. Handel’s Dead March in Saul (1738) became a favourite
funeral processional, as have, more recently, the ‘Marche funèbre’ from
Chopin’s Sonata in B
minor (1839) and the ‘Marcia funebre sulla morte d’un eroe’ from Beethoven’s
Piano Sonata in A op.26
(1800–01). Funeral marches stand as slow movements in Beethoven’s Third
Symphony and Mahler’s First. Beethoven’s march imitates the muffled drums of a
funeral cortège, and includes a recurring trio, a fugal development and an
expressive coda that greatly expand the usual march form. Mahler’s parody of a
funeral march, based on a minor-mode version of the folktune Frère Jacques,
was suggested by the nursery picture The Hunter’s Funeral. The tune
lends itself well to such treatment and, as each bar is immediately repeated,
the quality of the movement is lugubrious, despite its inclusion of a
grotesquely mocking trio. The funeral march in his Fifth Symphony emulates the
sound of a military band. This use of wind instruments for funeral music was
also taken up by Kodály (Háry Janos, 1927, no.18) and much later by
Kagel (Märsche um den Sieg zu verfehlen, 1978). Other well-known funeral
marches were written by Wagner (for Siegfried in Götterdämmerung),
Puccini (for Liù in Turandot), Mendelssohn, Gounod, Bizet, Pfitzner,
Bartók, Stravinsky, Honegger and Webern.
March
BIBLIOGRAPHY
GroveAM (‘Bands’, R.F.
Camus; ‘March’, P.E.H. Norton)
MGG2 (A. Hofer)
T. Arbeau: Orchésographie (Langres, 1588,
2/1589; Eng. trans., 1925/R)
M. Praetorius: Syntagma
musicum, ii–iii (Wolfenbüttel, 1618, 2/1619/R; ii, Eng. trans., 1986, 2/1991)
J. Mattheson: Das
neu-eröffnete Orchestre (Hamburg, 1713)
K. Tomlinson: The Art of
Dancing (London, 1735/R)
J. Mattheson: Der
vollkommene Capellmeister (Hamburg, 1739/R)
J.G. Sulzer: Allgemeine
Theorie der schönen Künste (Leipzig, 1771–4, 2/1778–9, enlarged 3/1786–7 by F. von
Blankenburg, 4/1792–9/R)
H.C. Koch: Musikalisches
Lexikon (Frankfurt, 1802/R; rev. 3/1865 by A. von Dommer)
G. Kastner: Manuel
général de musique militaire (Paris, 1848/R) [incl. anthology of early
marches]
C. Pierre: Musique des
fêtes et céremonies de la Révolution française (Paris, 1899)
H.G. Farmer: The Rise and
Development of Military Music (London, 1912/R)
M. Brenet: La musique
militaire (Paris, 1917)
J.P. Sousa: Marching
Along (New York, 1928)
R.E.M. Harding: The Origins
of Musical Time and Expression (London, 1938)
R. Blesh and H. Janis: They All
Played Ragtime (New York, 1950, 4/1971)
M. Reimann: ‘Materialien zu einer Definition des Terminus und des Begriffs der
Intrada’, Mf, x (1957), 337–64
B.A. Labash: The March:
its Origins and Development to a Culmination in the Music of Mozart (diss., Eastman School of Music, 1963) [incl. thematic index of Mozart’s marches]
J. Toeche-Mittler: Armeemärsche (Neckargemünd, 1966–75)
S.M.G. Sandman: Wind Band
Music under Louis XIV: the Philidor Collection, Music for the Military and the
Court (diss., Stanford U., 1974)
M. Schönherr: Carl Michael
Ziehrer: sein Werk, sein Leben, seine Zeit (Vienna, 1974)
R.F. Camus: Military
Music of the American Revolution (Chapel Hill, NC, 1976)
L.M. Kantner: ‘Zur Genese der Marschduette in der Grand Opéra’,
Anzeiger der Österreichische Akademie der
Wissenschaften, phil.-hist. Klass, cxiii/15 (1976), 322–34
L.J. Bly: The March in
American Society (diss., U. of Miami, 1977)
J. Subirá: ‘Marchas e himnos nacionales de España’, Revista de ideas estéticas, xxxv (1977), 95–113
L. Ratner: Classic
Music: Expression, Form, and Style (New York, 1980)
R.F. Camus: ‘On the Cadence of the March’, Journal of Band Research, xvi/2 (1981), 13–23
A. Hofer: ‘Bemerkungen zum Marsch im 18. Jahrhundert’, GfMKB: Bayreuth 1981, 325–32
E. Brixel, G. Martin and G. Pils: Das ist
Osterreichs Militärmusik (Graz, 1982)
A. Suppan: Repertorium
der Märsche für Blasorchester (Tutzing, 1982) [incl. alphabetical lists of marches and
composers]
L.J. Bly: ‘The March in the United States of America’, Bläserklang und Blasinstrumente im Schaffen Richard Wagners: Seggau
1983, 245–61
P.E.H. Norton: March Music
in Nineteenth-Century America (diss., U. of Michigan, 1983)
N.E. Smith: March Music
Notes (Lake Charles, LA, 1986)
A. Hofer: Studien zur
Geschichte des Militärmarsches (Tutzing, 1988)
R.N. Burke: The ‘Marche
Funèbre’ from Beethoven to Mahler (diss., CUNY, 1991)
A. Hofer: ‘Militärmärsche am Hofe des “Sonnenkönigs”: Voraussetzungen, Formen,
Auswirkungen’, Tibia, xvi (1991), 430–36
W.H. Rehrig: The Heritage
Encyclopedia of Band Music (Westerville, OH, 1991)
J.J. Hilfiger: ‘Funeral Marches, Dirges, and Wind Bands in the Nineteenth Century’, Journal of Band Research, xxviii/1 (1992), 1–20
A. Hofer: Blasmusikforschung:
eine kritische Einführung (Darmstadt, 1992)
A. Hofer: ‘“…ich dien auf beede recht in Krieg und Friedens Zeit”: zu den
Märschen des 18. Jahrhunderts unter besonderer Berücksichtigung ihrer Besetzung’, Tibia, xvii (1992), 182–91
L. Ratner: Romantic
Music: Sound and Syntax (New York, 1992)
F. Heidlberger: ‘Betrachtungen zur Rolle der Militärmusik in der abendländischen
Kunstmusik’, Militärmusik und
‘zivile’ Musik: Uffenheim 1993, 9–21
A. Hofer: ‘Zur Erforschung und Spielpraxis von Märschen bis um 1750’, Militärmusik und ‘zivile’ Musik: Uffenheim
1993, 41–53
R.M. Gifford: ‘The American March: the Development of a Genre from the Eighteenth
Century to the Present’, Interuationale
Gesellschaft zur Erforschung und Förderung der Blasmusik: Abony 1994, 189–204