Conn's first Eb Sousaphone (1907)

Photo courtesy of The Music Trade Review

Up to this point, the Sousaphones built by Conn have all been BBb instruments (whether four valve or three valve), but in 1907 Conn unveiled the "Giant Eb Bass Sousaphone" - presumably the first of its kind.

This was picked up by The Music Trade Review of December 28, 1907 (vol. 45, no. 26, p. 42), featuring the above photo and the following short article:

CONN'S SOUSAPHONE

One of the Remarkable Creations Made by the C. G. Conn Co.

In the front rank of enterprise may always be found C. G. Conn Co., Elkhart, Ind., as manufacturers of band instruments, and their reputation goes beyond the borders of the United States. One of the most unique examples of their craftsmanship and musical progress is the giant Eb bass Sousaphone, of which a splended illustration is presented herewith, and named in honor of the distinguished American bandmaster, John Philip Sousa, the "March King," as he is known the world over. This great instrument was designed by the skilled artists attached to the mammoth works of the C. G. Conn Co., and is manufactured exclusively by them. Its musical qualities and sonorous tone are the acme of perfection.


Of course, Conn continued to make available their other basses, including their popular three valve BBb Sousaphone, as shown in this feature page from 1907 (their four valve "Monster Sousaphones" presumably remained special order instruments):

Photo courtesy of Mark Overton at saxophone.org

Sousa and the Sloperphone?!

The March 4, 1905 edition of Ally Sloper's Half Holiday (a British comic paper, first published in 1884) decided to poke a little fun at Sousa and his newfangled Sousaphone while the band was touring England at that time:

Image courtesy of Paul Bierley, John Philip Sousa: American Phenomenon, p. 137

Since it's very hard to read, here's the written humor at the bottom of the page:

SOUSA AND THE SLOPERPHONE

Pa won't be beat! He's not going to play second fiddle to any Yankee living. If he'd been brought up to it he'd have been a great musician I'm sure - pity he never learnt. Since Sousa's splendid band has been over Pa has evolved an instrument of  tort- ahem, music, which makes the vaunted Sousaphone sing very small. Assisted by a few talented amateurs he gave a concert the other day. Mr. Sousa, F.O.S., kindly conducted and complimented poor Pa on an excellent performance. The wind was, perhaps, if anything a leetle too strong for perfect balance, still he had no doubt the Sloperphone had a great stare [?] before it - off the Newfoundland banks, as a fog-horn! -Tootsie.

I'm guessing that Sloper wasn't the first to consider the Sousaphone an instrument of torture!

UPDATE - November 27, 2015:

In searching for references to the word "Sousaphone" in old newspapers recently, I came across this paragraph in the March 25, 1905 edition of the Deseret Evening News (Salt Lake City, UT):

Hats off to the Sousaphone!

In Sousa's autobiography, Marching Along, the famous bandmaster recounts this story from 1904 when his band was playing at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD:

Photo showing the band there in 1907; courtesy of the Sousa Archives

A company of vaudeville artists were there and entertained the public a couple of times a day in the same hall where we gave our concerts. One of the actors had a comedy scene in which, among his properties, were about two hundred hats that were kept in a net; at a certain cue these were freed and came tumbling onto the stage.

We were holding the stage and, in response to an insistent demand, the band struck up the "Manhattan Beach" march. Just how it happened, I don't know; but in the middle of the number someone cut the rope that held the hats in the net, and we were the most surprised lot of men you ever saw when a shower of hats descended upon us.

In the bells of the Sousaphones they were piled nearly three feet deep. The laughter that overwhelmed the audience was so tremendous that you couldn't hear the band at all, although they valiantly continued to play!

Sousa does refer here to "Sousaphones," plural, which is almost certainly incorrect, as there is no evidence of more than one Sousaphone in his band until 1915. However, at the time Sousa wrote these words (1927-28), he had five or six Sousaphones in his band, so the slip is understandable. Plus, along with the one Sousaphone in 1904, there were three or four tubas, which would have caught a lot of hats as well!

Meet me in St. Louis, Louis

The Lousiana Purchase Exposition, popularly known as the St. Louis World's Fair, was held in 1904 to celebrate the centennial of the Louisianna Purchase (it was also the site of the summer Olympic Games that year). Opening day saw a huge crowd turn out:

Photo available online here

And providing music that day, and at other times during the Fair, was the reknowned band of John Philip Sousa:

Photo available online here

In addition, inside the Liberal Arts building, C. G. Conn set up what he called his "Palace of Music" as a way to showcase his band and orchestra insruments. The display won the Grand Prize, and in one of the beautifully decorated cases, "The feature [was] the Wonder sousaphone, the largest band instrument in the world, which was introduced by Sousa's band. This is quadruple plated silver and engraved" (The Music Trade Review, September 10, 1904, vol. 39, no. 11, p. 42).

Could it be that the Sousaphone Conn featured at the Fair is the one I played up at Interlochen?

[Bonus feature! Here's a historic recording of the song used for this post title]

Seeing this Conn Monster today

Along with the horn I played up at Interlochen, there are a few other examples of Conn's latest "Monster Sousaphone" - the improved model first seen in 1903 - that are still around today. They are considerably later than the Interlochen horn, but they look pretty much the same.

Here's one said to have been built in 1922 that is on display at Taylor Music in Aberdeen, SD, where it has been for the past 50 years:

All photos of this horn courtesy of Paul Schmidt

And, yep, this old horn not only looks fantastic for its age; it's also ready for action, as you can see:

According to the folks at Taylor, this Sousaphone was built in 1922 for John Kuhn, who played in Sousa's Band from 1915-1920, and was known as "Chief Red Cloud," which might explain the engraving on the bell:

Here is Kuhn that same year (1922) with Isham Jones and his Orchestra, holding what may possibly be the very same horn (other photos show him with a smaller three valve horn, but this appears to be a four valve "Monster"):

Photo found at Isham Jones Wikipedia site

At the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music, based at the University of Illinois, there is a very similar "Monster" from around that same time. The serial number is 208098, which places it around 1924 (according to the Conn Loyalist website), and records indicate that, at the very least, this Sousaphone was played in the University of Illinois concert and marching bands in the 1930s:

All photos of this horn were graciously provided by the Sousa Archives

One of the great things about this particular Sousaphone is that it still has its original case, giving us a better idea of what it was like to travel with such a large instrument. I'm told that the case with the horn in it weighs upwards of 150 pounds!:

Finally, a recent post on TubeNet revealed that at least one more of these "Monsters" is floating around out there - last seen a few years ago at the Disneyland Tuba Christmas:

Monster sightings after 1903

This "new, improved" model of Conn's "Monster Sousaphone," first seen in 1903, and featured in the two posts below, seems to have stood the test of time - at least in Sousa's Band. From what I can tell, no other large, four-valve horn ever appears in that group for the remainder of its existence (ending in 1932, with Sousa's death).

For example, here it is in 1905 at Willow Grove, PA, being held (I think) by Jack Richardson:

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

And here it is in 1907 at the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD, presumably held by Richardson again:

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

And here it is in South Africa, during the world tour of 1911, being held this time by Arthur Griswold:

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

And now for a few "close-ups"; here is William Bell holding the horn in 1921 at Willow Grove:

Photo courtesy of Paul Bierley, The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa, p. 60

And sometime later in the 20s (1927, I believe), here is Jack Richardson once again with that horn:


Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

Of course, there is no way to tell whether this is the same exact Sousaphone throughout these years, but it seems clear enough that it is the same exact model. And along with the horn up at Interlochen, there are at least a handful of these Sousaphones that can still be seen today, but I'll save that for the next post.

Hey! Did I play that Sousaphone?

The Sousaphone mentioned in the post below may very well be the one I played this past summer up at the Interlochen Center for the Arts in Interlochen, MI - the experience that sparked my interest in Sousaphone history in the first place:

Photo taken by John Beery, curator of the Greenleaf Collection at Interlochen

For years, that vintage "Monster" has been accompanied by a framed info sheet that claims that it is "The Original Sousaphone," built in 1898:

Photo taken by author

We now know that this claim is incorrect (see various posts below), but it was believed to be true from the moment that Sousaphone came to Interlochen. Here is one news clipping telling of its arrival:

Image courtesy of John Beery

However, as I noted in an earlier post, this horn - or one that looks just like it - has been viewed as Conn's first Sousaphone since at least 1949, according to this page from the March-April edition of The Instrumentalist from that year (vol. 3, no. 4, p. 38):


Image found by the author in the USC library

I have a hard time understanding how Ted Pounder, the very craftsman who built the first Sousaphone to  come out of the Conn factory back in 1898, managed to get his history wrong. For there is no evidence that I have come across to suggest that this particular version of Conn's "Monster" was created any earlier than 1903. And at the very least, we know that it is not the original "Monster" that we see Herman Conrad playing in photos from 1898-1901 (again, refer to various posts below).

So what about that old Sousaphone I played up at Interlochen this summer? Is it perhaps the one we see in action in Sousa's Band in 1903 in the post below? The serial number is 88983, which places it around 1905, according to educated guess at the Conn Loyalist website, so who knows!

What we can say for sure is that it is a very old horn, which Interlochen should be proud to possess, and I am honored to have played (and for what it's worth, it sounded really good!).

[UPDATE from December 2019: Click here!]

Conn's Monster evolves further

The large, four-valve "Monster Sousaphone," created by C. G. Conn in 1898, evolved further in 1903, as seen in this photo of Sousa's Band in London that year:

Photo courtesy of Paul Bierley, The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa, p. 46

Taking a closer look at the Sousaphone in this photo, two significant differences can be detected, when comparing this horn with the "Monster" we had seen in previous years:

First, the bell appears larger, and seems to sit higher above the head of the player.

Second, and much more obvious, the tubing that comes from the third valve is entirely different, as it now forms a long, straight line that sits below the fourth valve, and culminates in a small, double-wrap on the right before connecting once again with that third valve.

To see this change more clearly, here is the very same model Sousaphone - if not the exact same horn - about twenty years later, being held by Jack Richardson:

Photo courtesy of Paul Bierley, The Incredible Band of John Philip Sousa, p. 55

Compare that with the photo of Herman Conrad holding the modified version of the horn built in 1898:

Photo courtesy of Ian Church

Again, the bell seems to sit a bit lower on the older horn, and the third valve tubing configuration is clearly different. And from this point on (1903), this new version of Conn's four-valve "Monster" is the only one seen in Sousa's Band. In fact, by the 1920s, Sousa was using two of them (albeit with different bell and first branch sizes), along with three of the smaller, three-valve Sousaphones, as can be seen in this photo from 1927:

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

Conn really was the first - sort of

To this day, Conn claims to have created the first Sousaphone, but we have determined in numerous posts below that this is simply not the case. That honor belongs to J. W. Pepper, as Sousa himself declared.

However, as historian Margaret Downie Banks clarifies, Conn really was the first - that is, the first to build a "commercially available bell-up 'raincatcher' sousaphone." Pepper's horn, built around 1894-96, apparently never went into production, but Conn took orders early on for his four-valve "Monster Sousaphone," first built in 1898. By April 1900 there were ten of those horns being played in bands.

Two years later, Conn had come up with a slightly smaller, three-valve Sousaphone, which is seen for the first time in this advertisement in the December 1902 edition of C. G. Conn's Truth (vol. 5, no. 4, p. 27):

Image courtesy of Mark Overton at saxophone.org

This design was apparently a winner, for it remained unchanged at least through 1910 - with Conn even using the exact same photograph in his advertisement that year (and, presumably, all years in between):

Image courtesy of Mark Overton at saxophone.org

A few of the horns from this era can still be seen today. For example, the National Music Museum, in Vermillian, SD, owns one with the serial number 84672, which places it around 1904 (this Sousaphone is currently on loan to the Museum of Making Music in Carlsbad, CA):

Photo taken by author

And the wonderful people at the Sousa Archives at the University of Illinois graciously sent me this photo of their oldest Conn "raincatcher," serial number 99845, which dates it around 1907 (could it perhaps have been used very early on in the Marching Illini Band?):

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

By 1916, if not a bit earlier, even Sousa added one of these smaller, three-valve Sousaphones to his bass section, as can be seen on the far right of this photo (C. G. Conn's Musical Truth, April 1916, vol.9, no. 19, p. 30):

Image courtesy of Mark Overton at saxophone.org

And, interestingly, this basic Sousaphone design by Conn - with the exception of the bell direction - remains to this day, over one hundred years later, as the Conn 20K, which can be purchased for about $7,000 (roughly the same value as the original cost of $175 back in 1902, although one might rightly argue that the horn is less well-made now than it was all those years ago when Conn instruments were admired throughout the world).

Happy Birthday, Mr. Sousa!

While today is election day, it is also John Philip Sousa's 158th birthday, as he was born on November 6, 1854. Here is what the namesake of the Sousaphone looked like right about when the first Sousaphone was created by J. W. Pepper (1894-96):

Photo courtesy of the Sousa Archives

But since it is indeed election day here in the U. S., let me also include this photo of the Marine Band, led by Sousa, marching in the inaugural parade for President Grover Cleveland in 1885 (dress those ranks, boys!):

Sousa led this Band, which is known to this day as "The President's Own," from 1880 to 1892, serving under five Presidents - Hayes, Garfield, Arthur, Cleveland, and Harrison. Who will be our President after today? Make sure you vote!

The key to winning the election

With election day coming up in a few days, this is a good time to share that one U. S. President actually played the Sousaphone - Warren G. Harding, our 29th President (1921-23, having died in office). Here he is reportedly at the Republican Convention in 1920:

And here is the New York Times article, dated June 18, 1920, that talks about Harding's background as a tuba player. Note the last paragraph, which states, "one of the first men to congratulate him on his nomination was John Philip Sousa":

Was ist das? Ein Sousaphone?

A handful of posts ago, I wrote about Sousa's first European tour in 1900, and mentioned that I had not yet come across any reaction on the part of Europeans to that crazy new instrument called a "Sousaphone." But now I'm making some progress.

I have found that in The Music Trade Review dated June 23, 1900 (vol. 30, no. 25, p. 20), there is a brief article on "Sousa in Berlin" that mentions "the German Times, a weekly newspaper printed in English and circlulating throughout . . . the European continent." In it, Sousa's success in Berlin is confirmed, but there is no specific word about the Sousaphone.

But then I found the following translated quote from the paper Nachrichten, published in Dresden, dated June 16, 1900, and appearing in C. G. Conn's Glimpses of Wonders and Scenes of Their Creation, which came out in 1902:

The tone color of the Sousa Band differs materially from that produced by German brass bands, due to its visible difference in constitution. This is most marked in the case of the brass instruents which give out a softer and less blaring tone than is heard from our German musicans. Mr. Sousa is himself a skillful designer of instruments, and is - for instance - the inventor of the monster helicon, which is named after him, the "Sousaphone." To this better equipment and to the masterly art with which the musicians control and subdue the volume of sound at their leader's behest, is due satisfying tone moderation of the orchestra. The result is that it is possible to listen with delight to the band's performance of compositions usually played only by string orchestra.

Further, in the May 18, 1900 edition of L'Express, published in Liege, Belgium, the reporter simply says, "The cornets are clear, the tubas are enormous."

And in LePetit Bieu on that same day, published in Bruxelles, we find this hilarious comment: "The background bristles with huge transatlantic smoke stacks which could easily swallow the musician or musicians entrusted with their operation." I assume that is a reference to the bass section, which included Conn's "Monster Sousaphone"!

I hope to come across more references in the future, but this is enough to confirm that the Sousaphone indeed caught the interest and admiration of Europeans in 1900.

But before leaving this topic (for now), I was shocked to see the following photo, posted by someone on the tuba forum website "TubeNet":

This is supposedly showing a "Czech Brass Band in Russia (end of 19.c.)," but check out the back row. Could it be that Europe actually had something close to a Sousaphone before Sousa arrived in 1900?