Soon Philip, a handsome young fellow of nineteen, accepted a position as an orchestra leader in Chicago. And before long he went to Philadelphia to play first violin in Offenbach’s Orchestra which had come from France to play at the Centennial Celebration. He also played in Mrs. John Drew’s popular theater orchestra. Later he managed and coached a company of society folk in the Gilbert and Sullivan opera, Pinafore.
Then young Philip Sousa fell in love with Jennie Bellis, a pretty sixteen-year-old actress in the opera cast. In less than one year they were married and living in a little home in Philadelphia. Three children were born to them throughout the years, two girls and one boy, Helen, Priscilla and Philip Jr.
On October 1, 1880, Sousa was recalled to Washington from Philadelphia to conduct the Marine Band. He took the group of well-trained but disorganized musicians and succeeded in establishing fine cooperation and rare good feeling. He built the Marine Band into the finest marching band in all America. “The President’s Own,” as it was called, always played at the White House for social and state affairs.
At 26, Sousa was a man of distinctive appearance with his square-trimmed black beard, gold-rimmed eyeglasses and his always immaculate uniforms. He never failed to put on a pair of clean white kid gloves for each performance. In later years after Sousa had achieved great wealth, he stepped into a large Fifth Avenue store in New York City and nonchalantly ordered twelve hundred pairs of white kid gloves, at five dollars a pair.
Although Sousa conducted with a gracious dignity, he seldom smiled. Yet his audience keenly felt his strong, magnetic personality. He had no affectations or mannerisms but stood still in his place very erect, swinging his arms in precise unison in his own individual fashion. The music seemed to come from his expressive hands.
Sousa was a wonderful showman with a keen sense of spectacular effects. Once when giving an outdoor evening concert, he noticed the lights were turned on gradually. First a tiny speck appeared in the darkness, slowly growing into a glaring blaze of light. That gave him an idea. Sousa had his band begin the opening number, Nearer My God to Thee, in a soft, tender pianissimo just as the faint beam of light appeared. The music gradually increased in power as the lights grew brighter, ending in an enormous crescendo as the illumination reached its greatest strength. This was so impressive and pleasing that the audience requested this hymn and the accompanying lighting effects be played throughout the entire season.
The people, not only in the capital city but over the whole United States, were enabled to hear the finest music of the time through John Philip Sousa and the Marine Band. At his request Congress, for the first time, granted permission for the U. S. Marine Band to make concert tours over the country. Those opportunities were appreciated for that was an era when a fine band was a great novelty. Many people gladly traveled long distances to large cities to hear Sousa’s Marine Band.
After twelve years Sousa retired from this great organization. A syndicate of Chicago men asked him to come there and form a band “which would not be excelled by any brass band on earth.” He was offered a huge salary besides a generous interest in the profits. “And in addition,” said Sousa, “they purchased a half interest in all my manuscript compositions and in any others I may write through the next five years. For twelve years, I have been conducting in Washington and my heart is here, but this offer is too good to be refused.”
Sousa had no difficulty in forming his new organization in Chicago. Soloists on the various band instruments and expert bandsmen from all parts of the country, eager to join the famous bandmaster, applied for membership.
Beginning at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1892, this noted concert band traveled all over the United States, playing in every large town and city. They toured many foreign countries and in addition, made one trip around the world, winning the greatest success and honor wherever they appeared. Sousa and his popular band gave command concerts for England’s royalty, and it was a London newspaper man that gave him the title of the “March King.”