In May 1942, soon after the United States had entered World War II after Pearl Harbor, F D Roosevelt’s Vice President James A Wallace delivered the speech of his life, in which he cast a future world peace as meaning “a better standard of living for the common man, not merely in the United States and England, but also in India, Russia, China, and Latin America–not merely in the United Nations, but also in Germany and Italy and Japan”
“Some have spoken of the “American Century”. I say that the century on which we are entering—the century which will come into being after this war—can be and must be the century of the common man.”
As well as being translated into 20 languages and millions of copies being distributed around the world, the speech also inspired the leader of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Eugene Goossens, to commission a fanfare. He asked American composers to submit patriotic pieces to support the war effort, reprising a similar initiative during World War I and each one to precede the CSO’s orchestral concerts. A total of eighteen fanfares were submitted, including Fanfare for Paratroopers, Fanfare for the Medical Corp, Fanfare for Airmen, and one that became very famous, Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man.
The fanfare is written for four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, bass drum, and tam-tam, and is as stirring a piece of brass soundscape as one can imagine. It captures wonderfully the spirit of Wallace’s optimistic theme of ushering in a just future world. Below, let’s watch this dramatic rendering by the Dutch Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, and then listen to the brilliant prog rock version released in 1977 by Emerson Lake and Palmer (and which was my first exposure to Copland’s music).
