Under his leadership, the youth orchestra gained a national reputation in the 1920s, playing radio broadcasts and concerts in Los Angeles.

[3] In 1922, Marcelli wrote the music for a Grove Play entitled The Rout of the Philistines, a libretto written by Charles Gilman Norris.

[4] Frustrated with the lack of future professional-level musician work for his graduating high school pupils, Marcelli revived an idea that had for years lain dormant in San Diego: a civic symphony orchestra.

He obtained funding from Appleton S. Bridges and reformed the Civic Symphony Orchestra; the first concert was held at Spreckels Theater on April 11, 1927.

[3] The 80-strong ensemble, including vocalist Dusolina Giannini from Philadelphia, flawlessly played the prelude from Richard Wagner's Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's Symphony No.

In no small way, his founding of the Symphony created the awareness and drive that have made San Diego not only the cultural but an educational, scientific, and economic capital of the West.