March Music in Nineteenth-Century America.

This study of march music defines the march in form, style, and function in 19th-century America. A history of the origin of the march, before 1800, in European dance and military practices is also included. A distinction is made between the march as music, and the idea of the march, the latter serving as a common metaphor for the 19th-century idea of social progress and history. The study of form and style involved the examination of approximately 1,800 marches published as sheet music (an estimated 29% of all marches published as sheet music in the 19th century). Three basic styles of march composition were observed: the "gr and march style" (slow tempo, fanfare melody, and chordal texture) predominated early in the century; the "quickstep style" (quick tempo, tuneful melody, and light harmonic accompaniment) occurred most frequently in mid-century, while the "march style" (denser harmonic texture) predominated in the late 19th century. Nineteenth-century American music periodicals provided the major source of information on the function and role of march music. Rather than the 20th-century conception of the march as a single, rigid musical form, in the 19th century, there existed "music for marching" which referred to a variety of multi-strained forms composed with a strong steady beat for the purpose of regulating even, uniform stepping. While march music commonly served as music for the parade, dance, and parlor, an underst and ing of 19th-century march music dem and s that the march be accepted as dance. Research into dance history was included to illuminate the relationship among the 19th-century march, dance, and music, the key to that relationship being melody, which contained a dance's rhythmic pattern. The Quickstep form of the march, however, developed from the adoption of the cadenced step as a military tactic in the mid-18th century. Essentially a new musical form at the opening of the 19th century, the Quickstep became the march form most responsible for the particular structure and nature of 19th-century American march music.PhDMusicUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/159438/1/8314339.pd