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John Esputa, John Philip Sousa and the Boundaries of a Musical Career

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 April 2011

Patrick Warfield
Patrick Warfield
Affiliation:
University of Maryland
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Extract

From the standpoint of the twenty-first century, the breadth of John Philip Sousa's career seems remarkable and unprecedented. His marches, of course, continue to dominate concert band programmes around the world. But Sousa was also a notably profitable composer of dances, songs and descriptive works that were once performed not only by bands, but also by orchestras, soloists and parlour musicians. His successful run as a theatre violinist, operetta composer, novelist and commentator made the Sousa name omnipresent in late nineteenth-century American cultural life. Given his considerable breadth and remarkable fame, it is hardly surprising that Sousa's name is found in seven of the 20 chapters that comprise the recent Cambridge History of American Music (second only to Charles Ives).

Type
Articles
Information
Nineteenth-Century Music Review , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , June 2009 , pp. 27 - 46
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009

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References

1 The Cambridge History of American Music, ed. Nicholls, David (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

2 Sousa, John Philip, Marching Along: Recollections of Men, Women and Music (Boston, MA: Hale, Cushman, and Flint, 1928; reprinted, ed. Paul E. Bierley, Westerville, OH: Integrity Press, 1994): 7–9;Google ScholarSousa, John Philip, ‘In the Days of Their Youth: Being a Musician’, The Circle: A Modern Department Magazine for all People 6 (Sep. 1909): 127–8; andGoogle ScholarBierley, Paul E., John Philip Sousa: American Phenomenon (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1973Google Scholar; reprinted and revised, Westerville, OH: Integrity Press, 1998): 28. Sousa apparently did well in his studies as the Washington Star lists him, along with several other students, as a medal finalist at the Esputa Musical Academy in 1869: ’three days were consumed before the judges, Professors Scala, Wright and Egan, could come to any decision. Even then it was found that four of the scholars were so proficient (none of them missing a single question out of nearly 400) that the medal had to be withheld for a future examination at a later day. The names of these bright ones are Miss Mollie Wilson, Annie Harbin, Lizzie Stromberger and Master J. Siousa [sic].’ Washington Star (7 Jul. 1869).

3 Much of the data presented here was gleaned from clues left by a weekly column, ‘The Rambler’, that appeared between 1912 and 1952 in the Washington Star. From 1912 through 1927 it was written by J. Harry Shannon who provided his readers with considerable genealogical information mixed with a dry humour. Shannon penned a twopart article dealing with the Esputa family on 21 and 28 June 1925.

4 Muster Rolls, USS Constitution, 1835–1838Google Scholar, National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC (hereafter, NARA), and ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (21 Jun. 1925).

5 House Ledger, 1846–62, and Georgetown College Commencement Files, Special Collections Division, Lauinger Library, Georgetown University, Washington, DC. One of Esputa's students was a young James Ryder Randall, soon to be author of Maryland, My Maryland.

6 Young, James Sterling, The Washington Community, 1800–1828 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966): 66–8.Google Scholar

7 Preston, Katherine, Music for Hire: A Study of Professional Musicians in Washington (1877–1900) (Stuyvesant, NY: Pendragon Press, 1992):Google Scholar 19. The musicians appear to have been on equal social standing with the rest of the Navy Yard's population, as Shannon notes the Navy Yard was: ‘a sociable neighborhood, and a man was a man even though he played a saxophone. Of course, that's going pretty far.’ ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (19 Jul. 1925).

8 An F. Esputa is first listed in Boyd's Washington Directory in 1855 as a barber. Little is known about Susan Esputa. According to Shannon she was born with just a thumb and little finger on her right hand, but despite this she taught the Queen of Spain to play the guitar and do embroidery. ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (28 Jun. 1925). There is indeed an embroidered counterpane by Susan Esputa in the National Museum of American History, Washington, DC. My thanks to Doris Bowman of the Smithsonian for her help in locating this item.

9 ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (28 Jun. 1925). The Prosperis lived nearby and the family is the subject of Preston's Music for Hire.

10 John Esputa Case File, RG 127, Entry 76, NARA. Service in the military for a child of 12 may seem extreme today, but for boys of the Navy Yard it was almost inevitable. Regulations from 1837 allowed boys between 13 and 18 to enlist as apprentices, but the Naval Appropriations bill for the year ending 30 June 1859 altered the requirements so that boys between 11 and 17 could enlist. These regulations were not always followed, however. John Prosperi was a mere 7 years old when he became an apprentice in 1847. John Philip Sousa enlisted in the Marine Corps as a musical apprentice beginning in 1868, when he was 13.

11 Preston, , Music for Hire, 25.Google Scholar For more on the apprentice programme, see Carpenter, Kenneth William, ‘A History of the United States Marine Band’ (PhD diss., University of Iowa, 1970); andGoogle ScholarWarfield, Patrick, ‘“Salesman of Americanism, Globetrotter, and Musician”: The Nineteenth-Century John Philip Sousa, 1854–1893’ (PhD diss., Indiana University, 2003)Google Scholar.

12 The muster rolls indicate that Esputa briefly deserted the Corps between 2 September and 23 August 1854. Also strange is that his obituary in the Washington Star (27 Feb. 1882) lists Esputa as a former leader of the Marine Band (this is also stated by The New Century 17 (21 Feb. 1903). No history of the ensemble has suggested that this was the case. Esputa seems to have served as an Army musician during the Civil War as his name appears as Drum Major in the company band of the 15th Engineers Regiment, NY, between 14 August 1861 and 8 August 1862. He was commissioned as a Lieutenant, 2nd Class on 27 March 1863 and received a disability discharge on 2 September of that year.

13 Unless otherwise noted, the information on St Augustine's and Esputa's activities therein are from MacGregor, Morris J., The Emergence of a Black Catholic Community: St. Augustine's in Washington (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 1999): 57–8 and 488–95.Google Scholar The congregation changed names from St Martin's to St Augustine's during Esputa's tenure. For the sake of clarity, it will be referred to as St Augustine's here. The only trace of Esputa's connection to St Peter's and St Dominic's is found in ‘The Rambler’.

14 It is also possible that Esputa became attached to the black community through the abolitionist Senator Charles Sumner. According to ‘The Rambler’, Frank and John Pistorio, Marine apprentices and the sons of band member Nicholas Pistorio, studied with John Esputa at about the same time as Sousa. ‘The Rambler’ goes on to quote an unnamed source, ‘About the time when Frank and John [Pistorio] were taking music lessons from Prof. Esputa, Senator Sumner, who lived at the corner of Vermont avenue and H street, where the Veterans’ Bureau is now, being a fine violinist himself, heard the boys play and took keen interest in them, playing frequently with them and giving to Frank a fine old violin.’ ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (19 Jul. 1925). A brief history of the parish reports that William T. Benjamin served as the choir's first director. He was followed by a Mr Jackson, who was in turn succeeded by Esputa, . ‘History of St. Augustine's Church’, The New Century 17 (21 Feb. 1903)Google Scholar.

15 Sousa mentions the excitement of the Confederate attack on Fort Stevens in northwest Washington, often called ‘Early's Raid’, in Marching Along, 13. Robert E. Lee had dispatched Gen. Jubal Early to draw the Union Army away from the main Confederate forces in Virginia. Early intended to threaten Washington and to free the 17,000 Confederate prisoners held at Point Lookout, MD. The Confederates, while taking enough ground to gain a glimpse of the Capitol dome, never seriously threatened the city, but the excitement they produced impressed the nine-year-old Sousa.

16 For useful overviews of racial issues during this period see MacGregor, , The Emergence, 5–36; andGoogle ScholarGreen, Constance McLaughlin, The Secret City: A History of Race Relations in the Nation's Capital (Princeton, NJ: –Princeton University Press, 1967)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 See for example Schonberg, Harold C., ‘The Black Swan That Sang for the Nobility’, New York Times (12 Apr. 1970); andGoogle ScholarElward, Thomas J., ‘A History of Music Education in the District of Columbia Public Schools from 1845 to 1945’ (DMA doc., The Catholic University of America, 1975): 86.Google Scholar Elward assumes Esputa to be black because of his inclusion in Adams, Russell L., Great Negroes Past and Present, 3rd ed. (Chicago: Afro Am Publishing Co, 1969).Google Scholar In fact, Adams makes no mention of Esputa's race.

18 Catholic Mirror (19 Apr. 1873). Titles of musical selections are given as they appear in press accounts.

19 Catholic Mirror (11 Oct. 1873).

20 Catholic Mirror (9 Jun. 1877).

21 Fair Gazette (13 Feb. 1882); quoted in MacGregor, , The Emergence, 490Google Scholar.

22 Catholic Mirror (17 Jun. 1876) and Washington Star (12 Jun. 1876).

23 Catholic Mirror (17 Nov. 1877). The same piece was performed on Easter Sunday 1888, with a choir now ‘well known as one of the best musical organizations in the city’ and an orchestration by ‘Prof. Sousa, of the Marine Band, made for St. Augustine's choir’; Catholic Mirror (31 Mar. and 7 Apr. 1888). The Giorza mass was also performed for the opening of the first Colored Catholic Congress in January 1889; Catholic Mirror (5 Jan. 1889). A single page of Giorza's Kyrie arranged for four voices and orchestra can be found as item 63 in the Sousa Collection at the Library of Congress. Parts of the mass were later used in Sousa's Songs of Grace and Songs of Glory. See the clipping labelled Boston News, 8 May 1893, Sousa Press Book HJ 2, p. 13, Marine Band Library, Washington, DC.

24 Quoted in Catholic Mirror (2 Feb. 1878), emphasis in original. Charles Thierbach, a sometimes acting leader of the Marine Band, would take over St Augustine's choir after Esputa's death. Other Marine Band players also performed there, and on 24 April 1876, the Washington Star advertised a Grand Concert in aid of the church featuring ‘Prof. Schneider, of the Marine Band’.

25 Ibid., emphasis in original.

26 Catholic Mirror (24 Feb. 1872).

27 The Doctor of Alcantara was surely one of the most popular American examples of opera buffa between 1860 and 1880. It has also been called one of America's first examples of operetta. For more on the work see Root, Deane L., American Popular Stage Music, 1860–1880 (Ann Arbor, MI: UMI Research Press, 1981).Google Scholar A reprint of the revised version appears as Eichberg, Julius and Woolf, Benjamin E., Early Operetta in America: The Doctor of Alcantara (1879), ed. Kaufman, Charlotte R. (New York: Garland Publishing, 1994)Google Scholar.

28 Catholic Mirror (1 Feb. 1873). The principal actors in the opera were drawn from the church choir, and several reviews provide a list of the cast. They were: Mrs John (Jane) A. Smallwood (Donna Lucrezia), Miss Lena Miller (Isabella), Miss Mary A. Coakley (Inez), Mrs William Smith, Mr Frank Soevyn, William T. Benjamin (Doctor Paracelsus), Thomas H. Williams (Don Pomposo-Alquazil), Henry A. Grant, (Carlos), John A. Smallwood (Balthasar), Richard W. Tompkins (Perez) and George Jackson (Sancho). Many of these musicians have interesting biographies. Jane Smallwood was the daughter of Henry Warren, who purchased his own freedom in 1837, the freedom of his wife later the same year and four years later that of his 13-year-old daughter Jane. Mary Coakley was probably the daughter of Gabriel Coakley, who purchased his own freedom in 1857, and that of his family in 1858. Coakley never filed certificates of freedom, and so when the slaves of Washington were emancipated in 1862 he was able to file (and win) a claim for compensation, as he technically owned his family. MacGregor, , The Emergence, 7, 17–18.Google Scholar William T. Benjamin was the most celebrated of St Augustine's early singers and warranted an article in the Washington Post (7 Feb. 1902). His obituary appeared in the Washington Post (12 Feb. 1907).

29 Republican (Jan. 1873); quoted in Catholic Mirror (1 Feb. 1873).

30 Daily National Republican (1 Feb. 1873). The circular was addressed to Henry Cooke, the District's first Governor, and his very powerful vice-chair, A.R. ‘Boss’ Shepherd, who is often given credit for both modernizing the city and bankrupting it. Cooke was himself an avid supporter of amateur music-making in the city.

31 Washington Star (4 Feb. 1873). Only one review has been found naming any of these distinguished audience members; it notes that Senator and Mrs. Sprague and General Holt were present. Daily National Republican (5 Feb. 1873).

32 Daily Morning Chronicle (4 Feb. 1873).

33 Catholic Mirror (15 Feb. 1873).

34 Daily National Republican (5 Feb. 1873).

35 Philadelphia Evening Bulletin (22 Feb. 1873).

36 Vineland Weekly (NJ) (Feb. 1873); quoted in Trotter, James M., Music and Some Highly Musical People (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1878): 250Google Scholar; emphasis in original. It is remarkable that the Colored American Opera Company received an entire chapter in a book published just a few years after its creation.

37 Catholic Mirror (10 May 1873).

38 Washington Star (10 May 1873).

39 Daily National Republication (5 Feb. 1873).

40 New National Era (6 Feb. 1873).

41 New National Era (27 Feb. 1873), referencing ‘Philadelphia Press, 22d February’.

42 New National Era (15 May 1873).

43 In 1879, several members of the company starred in a production of HMS Pinafore at the National Theater, but they did not appear as the Colored American Opera Company. People's Advocate (10 May 1879).

44 The best sources on music education in Washington are Elward, ‘A History of Music Education in the District of Columbia’ and Elward, , ‘Pioneer Music Educators in the Nation's Capitol: They Made Black History’ Music Educators Journal (Feb. 1981): 35–8Google Scholar.

45 Report of George F.T. Cook, Superintendent of Colored Schools of Washington and Georgetown, in First Report of the Board of Trustees of Public Schools of the District of Columbia, 1874–75 (Washington City: M'Gill and Witherow, 1876).Google Scholar Board of Trustees reports were published each year beginning with the consolidation. So, the 1874–75 school year can be found in the First Report, the 1875–76 year in the Second Report, and so on. The first portion of each volume is dedicated to the white school districts, and the second part to the black schools. Unless otherwise noted, all quotations are from the Superintendent of the black schools, George Cook.

46 Esputa, , in Third Report of the Board of Trustees of Public Schools of the District of Columbia, 1876–77 (Washington City: R. Beresford, 1877): 255.Google Scholar

47 First Report, 251. Esputa's associate teacher, who preceded him in the schools, was Henry Fleetwood Grant. A study of the Grant family would make for an interesting documentation of African-American working-class musicians: one of Duke Ellington's childhood teachers was Henry Lee Grant, and Henry A. Grant was a member of the Colored American Opera Company. It is not known if these men were all related.

48 Ibid.

49 Ibid.

50 Ibid., 251–2.

51 Esputa, , in Third Report, 255–6.Google Scholar

52 Second Report, 180.

53 Ibid. One of these concerts, featuring some 500 students, was held in Lincoln Hall on 12 June 1876, and was reported in the Washington Star on 13 June. At the same time, Esputa was also teaching at his own private conservatory, and his students can sometimes be found in the press, for example the operetta Lailla was performed at the National Theatre by the ‘pupils of Professor John Esputa's school’. Washington Star (29 Jun. 1875).

54 Esputa, , in Third Report, 257.Google Scholar

55 Church News: A Catholic Family Journal (New Century) 14 (20 Jan. 1900): 5Google Scholar.

56 Washington Post (6 Jan. 1882).

57 Washington Post (17 Feb. 1882).

58 Even after his death, John Esputa continued to play an important role in Washington's musical life. The choir of St Augustine's performed a requiem by Esputa at the funeral of the church's pastor Felix Barotti in 1881, and for three years, beginning in 1899, Esputa's daughter Josephine Esputa-Daly conducted the choir. John Philip Sousa and Esputa-Daly would appear together on several occasions. On 20 December 1885, for example, Esputa-Daly served as a vocalist in a concert at the New National Theatre with the Marine Band, now under Sousa's direction. See Esputa-Daly's obituary in Musical America 9 (24 Ap. 1909): 8,Google Scholar Sousa Press Book HJ 31, p. 29 and Fowles Scrapbook, 20, Marine Band Library.

59 Sousa, , Marching Along, 5.Google Scholar

60 The 1877 Boyd's Washington Directory lists John Esputa, Jr as a printer. The next year there is a listing for John Esputa & Co., which notes that the principals are John Esputa, John Esputa, Jr, Richard Hamilton and Joseph Bart. Under Henry F. Bart in the 1878 directory, there is an advertisement for ‘H.F. Bart, (Successor to John Esputa.) Dealer in Sheet-Music, Music Books, Musical Mdse’. John Esputa is also listed as a member of the Executive Committee of the Washington Musical Protective Union in 1865. My thanks to John Spitzer who discovered this in the Charles Leland Bagley Collection, Special Collections Library, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.

61 Josephine Esputa-Daly, letter dated 3 May 1901 accompanying the quilt given to the National Museum of American History.

62 ‘The Rambler’, Washington Star (28 Jun. 1925).

63 Esputa, John, Esputa's Music Instructor, Calculated to Impart a Complete Knowledge of Music in a Rapid and Thorough Manner, Especially Adapted to the Wants of Schools, Seminaries, &c., to which is Added Scales and Exercises for the Various Brass Instruments, Composing a Brass Band (Washington, DC: John Esputa, 1870). This work became the official music textbook for Washington's Colored Schools, and multiple levels may have been published.Google ScholarEsputa-Daly, Josephine, like her father, would write a music textbook, this one called The Note Chain System (Washington, DC: Henry White, 1894).Google Scholar At 12 pages, this book is much briefer than her father's, to whom it is dedicated, and contains almost no musical examples; instead, the author suggests that students prepare their own.

64 That it is interesting was demonstrated by an event that took place at the Music Center at Strathmore outside of Washington on 16 February 2008. As this article was being prepared, Shelley Brown wrote and produced a theatrical event for the Strathmore entitled ‘Free to Sing: The Story of the First African-American Opera Company’. This sellout event included a performance of the Doctor of Alcantara featuring the Post-Classical Ensemble (Angel Gil-Ordóñez, music director; Joseph Horowitz, artistic director). Some audience members also attended an educational event with Raymond Jackson (Howard University), Karen Ahlquist (The George Washington University), Katherine Preston (College of William and Mary), and myself. A downloadable programme is available at http://strathmore.org/freetosing/freesing_commemorativeprog.pdf.

65 Sousa also explains that his first long-term musical job was as the leader of a band for Professor Sheldon's Fashionable Dancing Academy. This too may have been thanks to Esputa, as one advertisement directed potential students to inquire at Esputa's Musical Academy regarding the dancing school Sheldon was opening in the Navy Yard. Sousa, , Marching Along, 10, 24–5, 27–8;Google Scholar and Washington Star (22 Sep. 1868).

66 Sousa, Marching Along, 35–6.

67 Esputa, John in the Musical Monitor (30 Sep.1876)Google Scholar; quoted in Bierley, Paul, The Works of John Philip Sousa (Westerville, OH: Integrity Press, 1984): 80Google Scholar.

68 Gilbert Chase noted this when he introduced Sousa to his readers: ‘One of the many misconceptions about popular music is that a wide gulf separates it from “fine art” music; that all musicians must stand upon one shore or the other, with this gulf between them. But musical practitioners themselves – especially those on the popular side – have not, as a rule, been conscious of any such separation.’ Chase, Gilbert, America's Music: From the Pilgrims to the Present, 2nd ed. (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1966): 621–2Google Scholar.

69 Brion, Keith, ‘A Master of Programming’, The Instrumentalist (Nov. 2004): 50–53.Google Scholar See also Bierley, Paul, The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2006).Google Scholar

70 Clipping labelled Chicago Herald, ca. 10 October 1892, Sousa Press Book HJ 1, p. 11.

71 Ibid.

72 Sousa, John Philip, ‘How to Make Programs’, The Musical Record 383 (Dec. 1893): 15.Google Scholar

73 Sousa, John Philip; quoted in New York World (6 Aug. 1893), Sousa Press Book HJ 2, p. 65.Google Scholar

74 Clipping labelled Philadelphia Inquirer, ca. 26 March 1889, Fowles Scrapbook, p. 66.