John Philip Sousa for Monty Python's Flying Circus), "The Thunderer" and "The Washington Post". Sousa began his career playing violin and studying music theory and composition under John Esputa and George Felix Benkert. His father enlisted him in the United States Marine Band as an apprentice in 1868. After departing the band in 1875, Sousa learned to conduct. From 1880 until his death, he focused exclusively on conducting and the writing of music. He eventually rejoined the Marine Band and served there for 12 years as director. On leaving the Marine Band, Sousa organized his own band. Sousa aided in the development of
Hands Across the Sea (march) Hands Across the Sea (march) "Hands Across the Sea" is an American military march composed by John Philip Sousa in 1899. The march was written in 1899. When the march premiered the same year at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, the audience insisted that it be repeated three times. The march is "addressed to no particular nation, but to all of America's friends abroad." Sousa prefaced the sheet music's score with a quotation from the English diplomat John Hookham Frere: "A sudden thought strikes me; let us swear eternal friendship." The march was composed in the wake of the