GREAT FALLS — 100 years ago, the legendary composer John Philip Sousa came and performed in Great Falls. On Sunday, the Great Falls Community and Municipal Bands came together at C.M. Russell High School to perform a centennial tribute for one of Sousa’s visits.
The idea came from band member Tom Railsback, who considers himself a sort of expert on all things Sousa. He discovered that Sousa had performed in Great Falls several times in the early 1900s and thought a tribute concert would be well-received.
“Last Spring, I brought it up to the board meeting of the municipal band, and everybody was in favor,” Railsback said, “So we went ahead and started working on it.”
The performance consisted of eleven pieces, nine of which were written by Sousa.
The only time non-Sousa music was played was to highlight two solo musicians who were once in the municipal band. Jake and Hannah Kittleson are both in college studying music, and came back to perform a tuba and French horn solo, respectively.
Sousa is an iconic composer and bandleader known worldwide for his music, particularly his marches. Although a symbol of patriotism in the United States today, his popularity expands overseas.
“He really took what was a very young country at that point and brought our music around the world for people to enjoy,” Dusty Molyneaux, Conductor and Music and Arts Supervisor of Great Falls said, “And there's just stories all over the place of people in Europe, people in South America would just get up and start dancing in in the aisles.”
Sousa did more than just move a 100-person band around the world in the early 1900s. He revolutionized what a performing group can look like. His vision is still seen around the country today.
“The band that he formed basically is how public school concert bands have been formed and emulated ever since,” Molyneaux said.
At the end of the show, Molyneaux stepped back up to the podium to conduct one more surprise encore song: A Sousa-fied version of Jingle Bells, which resulted in applause throughout the room.
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