Drew Borden
Dr. John Petito
HIST151.NO2
11/5/2018
George Frederick Root
Throughout history, with civilization’s different cultures and ideologies, there has always been one constant strife with the human race. War. With how many years this planet has been around, civilization after civilization have seen and been a part of so many wars. Thousands of years have been burned through only to find that the basic premise of war has stayed exactly the same. The term for music used in battles or wars is deemed “Martial Music”, and this came to prevalence in Chapter 6 of the Old Testament’s “Book of Joshua.” The soldiers used ram’s horns to try to create enough noise to break down the walls of Jericho’s seven-foot-high fort of stone. Joshua’s strategy, involving the priests blowing their horns in unison, and weakening the Canaanites to defeat Jericho, was one of the first signs of martial music. This paper describes the history of martial music, delving into detail about one of the most famous battle music composers of the 19th century, George Frederick Root, and his life, achievements, accomplishments, and overall successes as a composer during the Civil War.
Pythagoras, an Ionian Greek philosopher, was one of the first people to mention the word “harmony” to describe music. His description, was that of a piece, or a shape or a sound fitting inside another piece, shape, or sound in such a way that it creates form. This form would go on to be the basis for many songs, and many structures of common melodies today. During the 16th century, during the Ottoman Empire, they were another example of a group of people who took to using the style of battle music to help fight their enemies, or raise morale for the troops. They would perform very poignant and crescendo pieces and often would have elements of percussion, bass, horns, bells, triangles and crashing cymbals. Later on, many other armies adopted the style of having a band play when they went out to battle. The British had marching songs, where they would have a set of people play while they march onto the battlefield. Typically, the British will move at a pace at which the average person would march, which is usually around 80-100 beats per measure. Loud thumping, interchanging melodies, and lots of wind instruments were used to convey the feeling of pride, victory, accomplishment and valor. During the Revolutionary War, the British would often have a drum, and a fife, which was commonly found being played in marching lines such as the British’s during the Revolution. Depending on the song, the drum would be played in sync with the beat of the fife being played, trying their best to match the pace and tone of the soldiers marching into battle. The American’s did not start to adopt this method of battle music until the Civil War, with both sides, the Union and Confederacy adopting this style of music to fit their battles. Music during the Civil War was at its highest popularity among the people and its soldiers, on and off the battlefield. The Civil War was a starting point for many soldiers and armies in America to start using the idea of music in their camps, and on the battlefield. Many soldiers in both the Union and Confederacy would have designated musicians that would follow them into battle, much like the British in the Revolution. Whole songs were sometimes played during and heading into the battle. To them, music was a transcendental experience, and was different for every listener. It brought back memories of home, family, friends, and times well spent. Many soldiers during this time would have said that the music that was played in these camps by the soldiers were better than any tonic, medicine, or any aid altogether. Both armies had their own traditions when it came to songs, and also had their own songs that told their own history and their own personal feelings toward anything they had to say. During this time of political strife, a composer from the North was making way in the field of creating and composing music. His name was George Frederick Root, and he was one of the most popular composers of Civil War music and battle music.
“Yes, we’ll rally round the flag boys, we’ll rally once again, shouting the battle cry of Freedom…” wrote George Frederick Root in his most popular battle song, “The Battle Cry of Freedom.” George Frederick Root, aka G. Friedrich Wurzel, was an American northern composer before and during the Civil War, was born in Sheffield, Massachusetts on August 30th, 1820. As a child, he accomplished many feats the normal child wouldn’t have been able to. He wasn’t much of a singer, but his knowledge of instruments was extremely vast. He was able to pick up an instrument, study it for a brief while, and be able to perform with that instrument at an extraordinary level. His personal dream in life was to be a professional musician, and even though at that time, the goals of someone who wanted to be a musician were often ridiculed or undermined, he still pursued his dream. His family ridiculed him, but his mother was exceptionally proud of him and pushed him to be his very best self. During the fall season of 1838, when he was 18 years old, he made plans to travel to Boston to further his career as a musician. He took lessons from a Mr. A. N Johnson, who was his employer at the time, and was giving him three dollars a week, room and board, and piano lessons to work form him. He would tend to people’s needs, keep the fires going in his office, answer questions anyone had in the building, and keep the place tidy for visitors and guests. He worked for Mr. Johnson over the course of a few months in the school called Harmony Hall, and during that time he met a fellow colleague by the name of Lowell Mason, who will be a key acquaintance in Root’s life growing up, and who he will inevitably come back to later in life to work for. Mr. Johnson offered Root a five-year contract to continue working with him, in that, included him learning how to be a teacher, and how to conduct classes working with many students and musicians who decided to come and learn at the school in Boston. He worked at the Harmony Hall as a teacher and as an organ player, and decided later on that he needed change. In 1835, a poet by the name of Fanny Crosby, was adopted into the New York Institute for the Blind. She was a critically acclaimed poet, while being both a student and a teacher at the school. She was blind since she was born, but she had written the lyrics to hundreds of thousands of poems relating to the Christian faith and her own religious background. She entered the school when she was just 14, and she was a student for nine years until she became a teacher for almost a decade. Root became very good friends with Crosby, with them producing fifty to sixty popular secular songs together. Root began to experience a world that was so unfamiliar to him. He was just a boy teaching and learning music in Boston and now, in 1850, he is making multiple study trips abroad to Europe, while studying in many places located in France, England, and other places as well. After his touring of Europe, he decided to return to Boston, as an associate of aforementioned friend, Lowell Mason.
After his studies with Mason, Root began to get involved in composing his own music quite heavily. He began working with gospel songs, and during this time, German composers during the 1850’s were at their most popular, and to capitalize on this surge of popularity, Root began going by the pen name of George Wurzel (German for Root) in an effort to become more popular and to spread his work as far as he could. He began collecting and performing his works at various churches and offered his music to church choirs for them to sing and present to their audiences. He began working for his brother’s music publishing company, called Root and Cady in 1859. He wrote many songs during that time but he began to see an increase in popularity when the Civil War struck. He wrote one of the most famous battle songs of the Civil War, called Tramp Tramp Tramp! which was a song to give hope to the Union prisoners of war. The song was written in the point of view of a Union soldier, and that the second half of the song is told from the Union soldiers telling the imprisoned soldier not to worry, and that help is coming. This was a big deal for soldiers that were prisoners in the war because of how neglected they may have felt while sitting idle and hearing of your fellow soldiers risking their lives for the cause day in and day out. One of Roots other songs, “The Battle Cry of Freedom” was extremely popular with Union soldiers all around. This quote is from an excerpt of a magazine published in 1888 describing the effect that Root’s song had on the soldiers in camp. “We’ll rally round the flag, boys.’ And it ran through the camp like wildfire. The effect was little short of miraculous. It put as much spirit and cheer into the army as a victory. Day and night, one could hear it by every camp fire and in every tent. I never shall forget how the men rolled out the line ‘And although he may be poor, he shall never be a slave.’ I do not know whether Mr. Root knows what good work his song did for us there- but I hope so.” (Stone 320). Much like martial music in the past, Root’s songs tended to have an impact on any listener that hears his work. He wrote the first one of his pieces two days before the attacks on Fort Sumner happened, which came at a time when people needed to look to something such as music for hope. Root had 35 war-songs that were successful. His songs were played on the battlefield, in camps, towns, in homes and in places where people needed spirit to liven themselves up. Tramp Tramp Tramp! Had become one of the most popular march songs of the Civil War, and the Battle Cry of Freedom became well known worldwide, and has been reimagined for other lyrics as well. Root was given the award for Musical Doctor in 1872 for his outstanding work in his career and for giving many people a glimmer of hope during the Civil War with his music. He never stopped being involved in music, and later in his career he was very important in the founding of the New York Normal Institute dedicated to the future of musicians and teachers alike. He died in Bailey Island, Maine at the age of 75 years old.