Patrick Gilmore: America’s Bandmaster

Brass bands and military marches have not been America’s favorite form of music for over a century, so perhaps contemporary folks can be forgiven for not knowing a name that in his own time rivaled, perhaps exceeded, that of John Philip Sousa. Patrick Gilmore (1829-1892) was considered “America’s Bandmaster” and the “Father of Military Bands” in his day. While he did compose music, and wrote the lyrics to “When Johnny Comes Marching Home”, his music has not lived on in popular memory like Sousa’s. But his accomplishments, as an bandleader (arranger, conductor, administrator), educator, entertainer, and public servant all call for celebration.

Born in County Galway, Gilmore emigrated first to Canada, making his way to Boston by the time he was 19. A coronetist, he had played with bands throughout his teenage years. In the States, he was a member of the town bands of Boston and Salem, and performed with  “Ordway’s Aeolians”, a blackface minstrel troupe**. He conducted the first promenade concert on July 4, 1855, on Boston Common, which some claim (and others parrot), without explanation, may have been some kind of precursor to the Boston Pops. The Salem band he belonged to played at the inauguration of President James Buchanan.

In 1858, Gilmore founded his own band. Two years later it was called into service when Civil War broke out. The entire outfit enlisted in the 24th Massachusetts Volunteers, remaining intact as a unit, a thing that manifestly does not happen any more. They traveled with Burnside’s troops to North Carolina, and made it as far as New Orleans, entertaining troops under Benjamin Butler.

Gilmore’s national reputation was made with two celebrations he organized in Boston. commemorating the end of the war. The National Peace Jubilee (June 15-19, 1869) featured 100 choral groups with a total of 10,926 singers, 525 musicians with the orchestra, and 486 musicians with the wind band. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote a special Hymn of Peace, set to music by Matthias Keller. A special stadium was built, adorned with patriotic bunting, and 40,000 people attended — an unprecedented spectacle.

He followed it up in 1872 with the 18-day World’s Peace Jubilee and International Musical Festival, meant to honor the end of the Franco-Prussian War. For this one, a dedicated coliseum seating 100,00 was built and participants were invited from all over the world. Among the highlights was a performance of Verdi’sIl Trovatore by a 2,000-member orchestra, conducted by the actual Johann Strauss, Jr., and 100 assistants, accompanied by a 20,000-voice chorus. Among the thousands of American participants were troupes of black performers, including the Hyers Sisters, another first. I was going to quip that the French may have sat this one out, having lost that war, but, no, the Garde Republicaine‘s military band came and played, bringing the newly-invented saxophone to American audiences.

After the second jubilee, Gilmore moved to New York City, where he took over the lease of Barnum’s Hippodrome and turned it into Gilmore’s Concert Garden, which became Madison Square Garden a few years later. His band played at Philadelphia’s Centennial Exposition in 1876, and at the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in 1886. His band toured Europe in 1878. It is widely and erroneously claimed throughout the internet that Gilmore played the first Times Square New Year’s Eve celebrations in 1888. Unfortunately, Times Square did not exist until many years after that. However his band did parade up and down Broadway to usher in that New Year. In 1891, his became one of the first musical outfits to be recorded by Edison’s phonograph.

Gilmore was in St. Louis, gearing up for big celebrations of the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s first arrival to the America’s in 1892 when he died suddenly as at age 62. If he’d lived just a little longer, he almost certainly would have been a presence at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago the following year.

Among Gilmore’s legacies were arranging techniques, pitting brass against woodwinds, employed by the big band leaders of the swing era.

**Obligatory Disclaimer: It is the official position of this blog that Caucasians-in-Blackface is NEVER okay. It was bad then, and it’s bad now. We occasionally show images depicting the practice, or refer to it in our writing, because it is necessary to tell the story of American show business, which like the history of humanity, is a mix of good and bad.

For more on show biz history,consult No Applause, Just Throw Money: The Book That Made Vaudeville Famous.