1. Band Music from the Civil War Era makes available examples of a brilliant style of brass band music that flourished in the 1850s in the United States and remained popular through the nineteenth century. Bands of this kind served in the armies of both the North and the South during the Civil War. This online collection includes both printed and manuscript music (mostly in the form of "part books" for individual instruments) selected from the collections of the Music Division of the Library of Congress and the Walter Dignam Collection of the Manchester Historic Association (Manchester, New Hampshire). The collection features over 700 musical compositions, as well as 8 full-score modern editions and 19 recorded examples of brass band music in performance. [In the Library of Congress' American Memory series.]
Special Presentations
- The American Brass Band Movement: A Historical Overview
- A Concert for Brass Band, Voice, and Piano
- Photo Gallery
- About the Instruments
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.
Civil War Band Collection: 1st Brigade Band of Brodhead, Wisconsin, University of Wisconsin Digital Collections. After a furlough over Christmas of 1864, the band returned south and participated in Sherman's march through the Carolinas. During a brief respite in the action in April, Kimberley reported that the band had received attention from Gen. Sherman, himself:
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. A profile of William Tidmarsh, Wauconda blacksmith and band leader of the 51st Illinois Infantry in 1861 and 1862, gives an account of a regimental band:
Numerous communities across Illinois had their own local bands in the Nineteenth Century, before and after the Civil War. A Wikipedia source estimates that there were 10,000 community bands across the United States in the late 1880s. In the days before phonograph, radio, movies, television, world wide webs, and in smaller communities without orchestral ensembles, the local band was the primary source of musical entertainment. Bands ranged in size from 12 to 25 members. Tidmarsh was the leader of the band in the Wauconda area. The Waukegan Weekly Gazette of October 12, 1861 put the population of Wauconda at 111, not enough of a population base to support the membership of a band; the members were drawn not only from Wauconda but also from surrounding farms and communities. The Gazette reported on October 26, 1862, "All or nearly all of this band are residents of this County."
The October 12 Gazette reported that "Mr. William Tidmarsh of Wauconda is authorized to get up a Regimental Band of twenty-four pieces, for [the Fifty-First Illinois]." Tidmarsh was able to recruit twenty players. All twenty were signed up on the same day, October 5, 1861, in Wauconda, by William Tidmarsh. He himself was enrolled one day earlier by Colonel Gilbert Cumming. It's as if the Wauconda Band became the Fifty-First Illinois Band. The community supported the effort, partially funding instruments for the band members. W. B. Clark, one of Tidmarsh's players, stopped by the offices of the Gazette to show off his new saxhorn. "It is a beautiful B flat instrument of German Silver, and has a range of two and a half octaves. The price was $65, of which our citizens donated $30" (November 2, 1862). The band left Lake County on October 22 and traveled to Chicago "to join the Chicago Legion [51st Illinois], to which regiment it is to be attached during the continuance of the war."
Until February 14, 1862, the band along with the rest of the Fifty-First was at Camp Douglas, Chicago, recruiting, training, and outfitting. Tidmarsh lost two members of the band to desertion even before the regiment left for the field: Edgar Brooks deserted on November 20, 1861 and Charles Bell on February 12, 1862.
The regiment's first field assignments were at New Madrid and Island No. 10 as part of General John Pope's army. In April, 1862, the regiment along with the rest of Pope's army embarked on river steamers to travel to Fort Pillow, Tennessee. Army participation in the Fort Pillow mission was aborted in mid-April and the regiment with its band steamed back up the Mississippi on its way to Hamburg Landing, Tennessee. When the fleet tied up at Cairo, Illinois to take on coal, the men of the regiment visited the town and Tidmarsh lost two more members to desertion: William McClain and Frederick Brown never returned to the boat. From April 22 to May 30, the regiment was engaged in the move against Corinth, Mississippi, which was evacuated by Confederate forces at the end of May. In mid-May a deputation of Chicago citizens came to Farmington, Mississippi where the regiment was camped and presented the regiment with its first set of colors. The ceremonies were elaborate and the band played its part. But, the band—along with most other Federal regimental bands—was not long for the world. As a cost-saving measure regimental bands were mustered out and sent home. The Fifty-First's regimental band was formally mustered out of the service on June 30, 1862 at Corinth, Mississippi. The government paid transportation home for the band members. The Waukegan Weekly Gazette reported the return of the band. "Last evening they gave our citizens a musical treat from the steps of the Court House. It is not too much to say that they were one of the finet bands in the army. We understand that they intend giving a few Concerts through the county, under their able leader, Mr. Tidmarsh, for the purpose of raising money to replace instruments lost [by other regiments] at the battle of Pittsburg Landing" (July 12, 1862).
The decision to muster the bands out was a hasty one—and certainly not a unanimous one at the highest reaches of military administration. ...
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. A HISTORY OF THE WIND BAND by Dr. Stephen L. Rhodes at David Lipscomb ... looks like class notes ... medieval, renaissance, 18th- and 19th-century Europe, England, America ...
[from table of contents] 6. The 19th-Century American Wind Band
The Brass Band Movement: Keyed Brass, Valved Brass, The Saxhorn - Brass Bands and the Civil War: Responsibilities of Bandsmen, Interaction between Union and Confederate Bands, Over-the-Shoulder Saxhorns - Professional Bands: The Dodworth Family, Great Entertainers, Monsieur Antoine Jullien - Patrick S. Gilmore: Gilmore vs. Kendall, Civil War Engagement, Oversized Concerts, National Peace Jubilee, World Peace Jubilee, Gilmore's Contemporaries, Gilmore's Band, Concert Soloists - John Philip Sousa: The Marine Band, The March King, Sousa Forms His Own Band - Creatore and the Italian Invasion - Patrick Conway - Frederick Innes - Arthur Pryor
No comments:
Post a Comment