"The Liberty Bell" (1893) is an American military march composed by

John Philip Sousa John Philip Sousa ( , ; November 6, 1854 – March 6, 1932) was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic music, Romantic era known primarily for American military March (music), marches. He is known as "The March King" or th ...

History

"The Liberty Bell", at the time a new composition as yet untitled, was written for Sousa's unfinished

operetta Operetta is a form of theatre and a genre of light opera. It includes spoken dialogue, songs and including dances. It is lighter than opera in terms of its music, orchestral size, and length of the work. Apart from its shorter length, the oper ...

"The Devil's Deputy" before financing for the show fell through. Shortly afterwards, while attending the

Columbian Exposition The World's Columbian Exposition, also known as the Chicago World's Fair, was a world's fair held in Chicago from May 5 to October 31, 1893, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. The ce ...

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

, Sousa and his band manager George Hinton watched the spectacle "America", in which a backdrop depicting the

Liberty Bell The Liberty Bell, previously called the State House Bell or Old State House Bell, is an iconic symbol of American Revolution, American independence located in Philadelphia. Originally placed in the steeple of Pennsylvania State House, now know ...

was lowered. Hinton suggested "The Liberty Bell" for the title of Sousa's unnamed march. Coincidentally, Sousa received a letter from his wife saying their son had marched in a parade in honor of the Liberty Bell. Sousa agreed, and he sold "The Liberty Bell" sheet music to the

John Church Company The John Church Company Building is a historic commercial building in downtown Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. Designed by one of Cincinnati's most prominent architects, it was home to one of the country's leading vendors of sheet music and mu ...

for publication; the new march was an immediate success. The march is played as part of an exhibit in the

Liberty Bell Center The Liberty Bell, previously called the State House Bell or Old State House Bell, is an iconic symbol of American independence located in Philadelphia. Originally placed in the steeple of Pennsylvania State House, now known as Independence Ha ...

. The

United States Marine Band The United States Marine Band is the premier band of the United States Marine Corps. Established by act of Congress on July 11, 1798, it is the oldest of the United States military bands and the oldest professional musical organization in the ...

has played "The Liberty Bell" march at five of the last seven presidential inaugurations: the 1993 inauguration of President

Bill Clinton William Jefferson Clinton (né Blythe III; born August 19, 1946) is an American politician and lawyer who was the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, ...

,''Bill Clinton Presidential Inauguration 1993 (Part 1 of 3)''
see 6:21–9:10, on

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the 2005 inauguration of President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...

, the 2009 and 2013 inaugurations of President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

, and the 2017 and 2025 inaugurations of President

Donald Trump Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who is the 47th president of the United States. A member of the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he served as the 45 ...

. The ship's bell from the '' SS John Philip Sousa'', a World War II

Liberty ship Liberty ships were a ship class, class of cargo ship built in the United States during World War II under the Emergency Shipbuilding Program. Although British in concept, the design was adopted by the United States for its simple, low-cost cons ...

, is housed at the Marine Barracks and is used by The President's Own in select performances of the march. "The Liberty Bell" is also the official march of the

Canadian Forces The Canadian Armed Forces (CAF; , FAC) are the unified Military, military forces of Canada, including sea, land, and air commands referred to as the Royal Canadian Navy, Canadian Army and the Royal Canadian Air Force. Under the ''National Defenc ...

Public Affairs Branch.

Composition

The march follows Sousa's "extended" trio form: "HEAD (intro, 1st strain, 2nd strain), TRIO (trio A), interlude, Triumphal return (trio B + final trio)", which since the ''Liberty Bell'' has become a standard for military marches. The trio uses

tubular bell Tubular bells (also known as chimes) are musical instruments in the percussion family. Their sound resembles that of church bells, carillons, or a bell tower; the original tubular bells were made to duplicate the sound of church bells withi ...

s to symbolize the Liberty Bell ringing.

Instrumentation

This is scored for 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, 4 horns, 2 trumpets, 3 trombones, tuba, timpani, cymbals, bass drum, snare drum, and strings.

Use in ''Monty Python's Flying Circus''

A version of the march, performed by the Band of the Grenadier Guards and published in 1938, was used as the opening theme of the British TV comedy program ''

Monty Python's Flying Circus ''Monty Python's Flying Circus'' (also known as simply ''Monty Python'') is a British surreal humour, surreal sketch comedy series created by and starring Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Terry Gilliam, w ...

'' (1969–1974). Cast member

Terry Gilliam Terrence Vance Gilliam ( ; born 22 November 1940) is an American-British filmmaker, comedian, collage film, collage animator, and actor. He gained stardom as a member of the Monty Python comedy troupe alongside John Cleese, Eric Idle, Michael Pa ...

, the only American member of the troupe, argued for the use of "The Liberty Bell" because it had fallen into the

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by that time and could thus be used without the need to pay

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. He has said the piece was chosen because the troupe thought it would not be associated with the program's content, and that the first bell strike and subsequent melody would give the impression of getting "straight down to business." The Monty Python mode of presenting the tune was with a single strike of the bell, lifted from the third section and increased in volume, followed by a strain of each of the first two sections, followed by the famous stomping foot animation and a noticeably

flatulent Flatulence is the expulsion of gas from the intestines via the anus, commonly referred to as farting. "Flatus" is the medical word for gas generated in the stomach or bowels. A proportion of intestinal gas may be swallowed environmental a ...

"splat" sound reminiscent of a

whoopee cushion A whoopee cushion (also spelled whoopey cushion or whoopie cushion) is a practical joke device, which emulates the sound of flatulence. History and modern usage Records of a whoopee cushion date back to the 10th-century Aghlabid emir of Ifriqiy ...

(the first 13 episodes used a "

raspberry The raspberry is the edible fruit of several plant species in the genus ''Rubus'' of the Rosaceae, rose family, most of which are in the subgenus ''Rubus#Modern classification, Idaeobatus''. The name also applies to these plants themselves. Ras ...

"). At the end of the film '' Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl'', the entire march was played over the

closing credits Closing credits, aka end credits or end titles, are a list of the cast and crew of a particular motion picture, television show, or video game. While opening credits appear at the beginning of a work, closing credits appear close to or at th ...

Other uses

NASA played the march as wake-up calls for two

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

missions: STS-61-C on January 12–18, 1986, and STS-63 on February 3–11, 1995.

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies Corp., commonly referred to as SpaceX, is an America, American space technology company headquartered at the SpaceX Starbase, Starbase development site in Starbase, Texas. Since its founding in 2002, the compa ...

used the march as background music for their video ''How Not to Land an Orbital Rocket Booster'', a compilation of failed rocket landings to celebrate their efforts in pioneering orbital launch vehicle reusability.

References

External links

The Liberty Bell (audio file)
– In

MIDI Musical Instrument Digital Interface (; MIDI) is an American-Japanese technical standard that describes a communication protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, ...

format; from th
John Philip Sousa website
maintained by David Lovrien, hosted by the Dallas Wind Symphony
The ''Monty Python'' versionarchived
– In

MP2 MP2 or MP-2 may refer to: Aviation * The second terminal of Marseille Provence Airport * Chyetverikov ARK-3 flying-boat Firearms * German Army designation for the Uzi * MP-2 machine pistol Science * MP 2, an abbreviation for a zone during t ...

format; from th
same website

An 1896 Recording (Probably the first)
played by the Edison Grand Concert Band, from the

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

Sheet music
for a piano arrangement, courtesy of the Mutopia Project {{DEFAULTSORT:Liberty Bell, The 1893 compositions American military marches Comedy television theme songs Compositions in F major Compositions for symphony orchestra Orchestral marches Concert band pieces Monty Python Songs written by John Philip Sousa Sousa marches