by circus bands. The Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey circuses presented their bands performing live march music. Typically, they played a special variety of marches known descriptively as screamers, two-steps, and cakewalks. These tunes served to energize the crowd and focus attention on the circus acts being performed. Marches and the marching band The march music era in the U.S. saw the development of college and high school marching bands, which typically were organized to perform march music during half-time shows and pep-rallies. Composers often dedicated marches to a favored university band. John Philip Sousa American composer John Philip Sousa revolutionized American march music. His prolific production of quality marches greatly advanced the genre's popularity. According to researcher Paul Bierley, Sousa's marches were known for their simplicity and understatement with rousing counterpoint and overall energy. Sousa standardized the military march form in America, see below. His marches are typically marked by a "subdued" trio—as in "The Stars and Stripes Forever", where most of the performing band becomes subordinated to arguably the most famous piccolo obligato in all of music. Sousa's magnum opus, "The Stars and Stripes Forever" was adopted in 1987 as the national march of the United States. Sousa was prolific as both composer and orchestrator, writing 137 marches and more than 80 significant pieces, including operettas, overtures, suites, dances, and fantasies, and publishing some 322 arrangements of nineteenth-century western European symphonic works. He directed the design and production of his namesake instrument, the sousaphone, for its specialized adaption for use in a marching band. For its ease of carry and its forward-directed sound, the sousaphone is widely employed in marching bands and other musical venues. Notable march composers in the United States Most march composers were from the United States or Europe. Publishing new march music was most popular during the late 19th and early 20th centuries; sponsors of the genre began to diminish after that time. Following is a list of march music composers whose marches are still performed in the United States. Russell Alexander (1877–1915) Kenneth Alford (1881–1945) "The British March King" Edwin Eugene Bagley (1857–1922) Hermann Louis Blankenburg (1876–1956) W. Paris Chambers (1854–1913) Charles E. Duble (1884–1960) Henry Fillmore (1881–1956) "The Trombone King" Julius Fucik (1872–1916) "The Czech March King" James M. Fulton (1873–1940) "Associated Press," "Waterbury American" Bernard Gilmore (1937-2013) "Five Folk Songs for Soprano and Band" Edwin Franko Goldman (1878–1956) "The American