The 1933 Chicago World’s Fair

Saturday, November 8, 2025
– 7:30pm –
Centennial Auditorium – Sterling High School

• John Phillip Sousa “A Century of Progress”
• Samuel Coleridge-Taylor The Bamboula (Rhapsodic Dance)
• Calvin Custer, arr. Duke Ellington!
• Florence Price Symphony No. 1 in E minor

This musical flashback takes us back to the 1933 Chicago World’s Fair—an event that saw an exposition for which John Phillip Sousa composed the Fair’s theme song. Duke Ellington performed and the Chicago Symphony performed the first symphony written by an African American woman— Florence Price.

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Introduction:

In 1933, Chicago hosted an historic world’s fair called The Century of Progress
International Exposition. For five and a half months, the landmark event celebrated
technological innovation, cultural exchange, and optimism during the Great Depression
era, and millions of visitors from around the world came to experience advancements in
science, industry, design, and artistic expression. 
Musically, the event was stupendous. The greatest living American composer of the time,
John Philip Sousa, composed the theme music for the fair—“A Century of Progress
March.” The official film of the fair featured Duke Ellington, a jazz innovator who was
just coming to the nation’s attention through his residency at New York City’s Cotton
Club. And Ellington performed live at the fair, too. The Chicago Symphony Orchestra
performed 125 concerts at the fair. But one of those concerts was very special. 
On Thursday, June 15, 1933, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra performed a series of
pieces composed by Black composers, including “The Bamboula” by Samuel Coleridge-
Taylor and Florence Price’s First Symphony. This symphony, composed in 1932,
reflected an emerging voice of diversity and empowerment in American music,
challenged prevailing racial and gender barriers, and paved the way for future generations
of artists. It was the first performance of a symphony by an African American woman to
be performed by a major orchestra. 
On November 8, we celebrate the amazing Century of Progress International Exposition by
presenting music that attendees would have heard there. The composers—Sousa,
Coleridge-Taylor, Ellington, and Price—illustrate a historical period marked by
resilience, innovation, and the continual pursuit of progress, leaving lasting legacies that
continue to inspire today.
Silas Nathaniel Huff

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Program Notes:

John Philip Sousa 1854-1932
Although John Philip Sousa has been stereotyped as the “March King”, he composed
music in many forms, including 15 operettas, suites, fantasies, humoresques and dances.
An indefatigable worker, by 1880 his fame as a conductor, composer and arranger led to
his appointment as leader of the U.S. Marine Band, a position he held for 12 years.
After resigning from the Marine Corps, he formed his own civilian band, traveling the
world in 1910 as well as touring the U.S. annually. His Sousa Band was hired to celebrate
Chicago’s extraordinary growth in 1933. Asked to compose a march specifically for the
“Century of Progress”, he responded with a march of the same name. Sadly, he passed
away at the age of seventy-seven, prior to the fair’s opening, although the general
manager of the fair saw to it that his composition was named its official march.

Samuel Coleridge-Taylor 1875-1912
Coleridge-Taylor was an English composer born in 1875 to an English mother and an
African father. Taught violin by his mother, he quickly showed such remarkable talent,
he began studying at the Royal College of Music where he shifted his interest to
composition. Overcoming racial and financial barriers, he became a popular composer,
touring the U.S. and invited to visit President Theodore Roosevelt.
Working right out of school, Coleridge-Taylor was hired as a professor and conductor,
described by Edward Elgar as “far and away the cleverest fellow going amongst the
younger men.” Becoming increasingly interested in traditional African music, he began
incorporating it into his own works, seeking to integrate African traditions with Western
classical music. The music that made him famous was The Song of Hiawatha, a set of
cantatas based on Longfellow’s famous poem in 1855.
The famous poet Samuel Taylor- Coleridge was not only his namesake, but a source
of inspiration during his short life. He died of pneumonia in 1912 at the age of thirty-
seven, yet managed to compose nearly a hundred works, working to revitalize folk songs
and motifs.
In an earlier composition, 24 Negro Melodies, Coleridge-Taylor celebrated the music
of Africa, the traditional melodies which helped slaves labor all day in the scorching heat.
The music united the slaves and gave them strength and a way to express their pain, hope
and joy.
One of the 24 pieces is The Bamboula, the name of a drum and a dance brought to
America and the Caribbean by African slaves. Here, he puts the simple melody into a
dance format creating dramatic contrasts, strong rhythmic momentum, repeated motifs
and vivid orchestral coloring. The entire piece embodies a fusion of African culture and
Western orchestral technique, his stated aim to treat Black musical material with dignity
and structural integrity.

Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington 1899-1974
Duke Ellington, an influential American composer, pianist and jazz band leader,
became a major figure in 20th century music. He led his orchestra for over 50 years,
creating more than two thousand compositions pushing the boundaries of jazz. He was
known for his distinctive orchestra sound, writing music that showcased his musicians’
talents and explored a wide range of emotions and images.
Born and raised in Washington D.C., he began piano lessons by the age of seven, but
by 14 his exposure to ragtime music drew him to jazz. He began composing music and
playing in ensembles, eventually forming his own group, The Duke’s Serenaders, playing
in both Black and white communities. Moving to New York City, his band grew into an
orchestra, which hit the stage at Harlem’s prestigious Cotton Club. Ellington flourished
even during the Great Depression, touring, playing Broadway shows and appearing in
movies, gaining worldwide recognition.

Ellington and his orchestra broke racial barriers, performing in hotels and theaters that
once barred Black artists. He became a cultural ambassador for the State Department as a
result of his world tours. He has a versatile style of music all his own, from the jungle
rhythms of the Cotton Club to the swing played on the dance floor. Always experimental,
he pushed boundaries while constantly reinventing himself as a musician.

Florence Beatrice Price 1887-1953
Florence Price, an American composer, pianist and music teacher, born in Little Rock,
Arkansas, showed her talent early, giving her first piano performance at the age of four
and publishing her first composition at eleven. She studied at the New England
Conservatory, one of the few institutions to accept Black students at that time, graduating
with honors in both piano and organ. Her early career included teaching and composing,
but racial prejudice in the South led her to move to Chicago during the Great Migration,
where she found a supportive artistic community.
Her Symphony No. 1 is a landmark work that blended European late-Romantic
traditions with African American spirituals, folk rhythms and melodies. It was the first
symphony by a Black woman to be performed by a major American orchestra, a
milestone achieved by the Chicago Symphony who premiered it at the Chicago World’s
Fair in 1933. After its premiere, the work fell into relative obscurity until 2009 with the
discovery of many of her manuscripts, sparking a major revival of her work, bringing her
music back to concert halls and reestablishing her as a pioneering figure in American
music history.
Symphony No. 1 opens with a bassoon solo and contains themes based on melodies
reminiscent of African American spirituals. The second movement, Largo maestoso,
begins with an original hymn introduced by a ten-part brass choir, featuring a call- and-
response pattern. As in all her symphonies, Price replaced the traditional scherzo with a
playful Juba Dance, a syncopated African folk dance that predates ragtime. The final
Presto incorporates driving rhythms and folk-inspired themes for an energetic and
triumphant ending.

Program notes by Karin Anderson-Sweet