Hands Across the Sea (march)

When the march premiered on April 21 at the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, the audience insisted that it be repeated three times.

"[3] In 1901, John Philip Sousa heard the Virginia Tech Regimental Band (The Highty-Tighties) playing "The Thunderer" at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.

[4] Sousa prefaced the sheet music's score with a quotation from the English diplomat John Hookham Frere: "A sudden thought strikes me; let us swear eternal friendship.

[3] One reviewer describes the march this way: "Hands Across the Sea opens with a jaunty, carefree theme, the wind sonorities light and generally in their middle and upper ranges.

The work closes with this spirited theme playing proudly, the brass flamboyant, the cymbals crashing, and the whole brimming with festivity and vivid color.