The
Manager of Philip Sousa "The March King"
With
thanks to Alan Kozakiewicz of Niskayuna, NY
David
BLAKELY was born in 1833. He was a relatively wealthy
man who had, at one time been the Secretary of State of
Minnesota State. Editor of the Chicago Post and President
of the Minnesota Philharmonic Orchestra. He turned to printing
and publishing in the 1880's (BLAKELY
Printing Co. of Chicago) and
had also undertaken musician management as a sort of
"hobby". He had managed a couple of successful bands (Patrick
Gilmore was one; apparently successful contemporary of Sousa)
and was looking for new acts. He
had some difficulty with potential European prospects
due to immigration uncertainties and
problems with local musician guilds and was looking for a
nice stable American client.
BLAKELY approached Sousa in 1892 while he (Sousa)
was still an employee of the U.S. Government. Using a clever
strategem designed to force Sousa to decide, he convinced
him to leave the military and form a partnership
for the purposes of touring a Sousa Band and publishing Sousa
Music. Sousa and BLAKELY entered into a business arrangement
with Sousa drawing a $6000.00 annual salary (four
times his earnings with the U.S.Government and 20% of all
proffits. Sousa was required to invest $1000.00 in the enterprise.
e terms of the partnership was to last 5 years.
Sousa and BLAKELY had a love-hate relationship. BLAKELY
was apparently a fairly cynical (or pragmatic,
depending on your viewpoint)
businessman who underestimated, somewhat, the
ultimate popularity of Sousa. He
failed for example to publish but a few of his
compositions in the belief that Sousa had "shot his
wad" with previous hits and it was unlikely that he would
repeat those earlier successes with a fickle American
public. Sousa, on the other hand, was probably
a prima donna who recognized
the importance of sound business management
but bristled under the artistic restraints it imposed.
Much boring stuff happened in the intervening years,
with BLAKELY booking Sousa all over the country and Europe
in various Expositions and such. Sousa became
very popular and BLAKELY became very wealthy.
Here is an interesting aspect to the story:
While on a European vacation with
his wife in 1896, and sometime after
the news of the election of William
McKinley reached Italy, Sousa learned of BLAKELY's sudden
death from a 'stroke' in his New York office. Sousa cut short
his vacation and set sail from Rome to New York, through
Liverpool on the SS Teutonic to put his
business management affairs in order. While on this
trip and while the death of BLAKELY weighed
heavily on his mind, Sousa composed the
Stars and Stripes Forever, the most famous and popular
Sousa work and, arguably, one of the most recognizable pieces
of American music ever.
Sousa resolved to take care of Ada BLAKELY
(David's wife), but she apparently decided to "take care"
of Sousa! She turned over the
operation of BLAKELY's enterprise to a relative who
decided to put the squeeze on
poor Mr Sousa, cutting his salary by $100.00 a week
and demanding ownership of Sousa's works and control
over his band's operations. Sousa told the
heir to "shove it" and set off on his own.
This left the question of the
ownership of Sousa's compositions and name subject
to resolution through litigation (
a lasting American tradition it would seem).
The legal issues were, apparently, the degree
of survival of the BLAKELY-Sousa patnership (most partnerships
dissolve upon the death of either party) and the
relationship of Sousa to the enterprise
(employee or partner). Sousa was apparently
so anxious to get out of government
service that he neglected to give his contract with BLAKELY
a careful reading. The issues took several years to
resolved and were tried in a Pennsylvania court
with a decision rendered in 1900. Neither paty got everything
they wanted: Sousa had to surrender ownership of the
works prior to the death of BLAKELY, but
he retained full ownership of the Sousa name.
