 | Part II: The 1800s |
by David Johnson
 | ||||||
| 1814 | 1842 | 1861 | 1880 | 1891 | 1897 | Next: 1900-1920 |
| ||||||
| 1814 | Francis Scott Key writes poem The Defense of Fort McHenry, which appears in The Baltimore Patriot newspaper |
| 1815 | Key puts The Defense of Fort McHenry to music of popular British song, To Anacreon in Heaven, and publishes "The Star-Spangled Banner" |
| 1842 | Philharmonic Society of New York founded, nation's oldest symphony orchestra |
| Circa 1850 | Col. Sandford C. Faulkner believed to write music and words to The Arkansas Traveler, song (and also a play) about a country fiddler, popular in Ohio River Valley |
| 1851 | Stephen Foster writes "Old Folks at Home" for a minstrel show |
| 1861 | Julia Ward Howe writes poem for Atlantic Monthly, "Battle Hymn of the Republic," based on hymn, "John Brown's Body"; William Steffe (probably) writes music to create popular Civil War song |
| 1866 | Musical play, The Black Crook, forerunner of musical comedy of 1920s |
| 1878 | New York Symphony Orchestra founded |
| 1880 | In Spring, by John Knowles Paine, performed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, first American symphony published in U.S. |
| 1881 | Henry Lee Higginson establishes Boston Symphony Orchestra |
| 1883 | Metropolitan Opera House opens in New York |
| 1891 | Carnegie Hall opens in New York |
| 1897 | John Philip Sousa composes march "Stars and Stripes Forever"; creates more than 100 popular marches, orchestral music |
| 1897 | Composers Scott Joplin, James Scott, and Joseph Lamb establish, popularize ragtime, give birth to America's popular music industry, ending reliance on Europe |
