Annotation:Turk's March (3)
X:1 T:Turk’s March [3] T:Quick Step from/in the Battle of Prague M:2/4 L:1/8 R:March K:D a>g ff|f>e dd|ed ec|d/e/f/e/ d/e/f/g/|a>g ff|f>e dd|e>d ec d2z2:| e2f2|gg/f/ ee|f2g2|aa/g/ fa|ag gf|ag gf|ab/a/ gf|f>e e2:| a>g ff|f>e dd|ed ec|d/e/f/e/ d/e/f/g/|a>g ff|f>e dd|e>d ec|d2 z2||
TURK’S MARCH [3]. AKA – "Turkish March," “Turkish March in the Battle of Prague.” AKA and see "Quick Step from the Battle of Prague." English, March (4/4 time). D Major. Standard tuning (fiddle). AAB. "Turk's March" or "Turkish March" was composed as "Quick Step from the Battle of Prague" by Czech composer, violist and double-bassist Frantisek Kotswara (1730-1791) for his very successful opera The Battle of Prague (1788), based on the 1757 Battle of Prague, in which the Kingdom of Prussia fought the Habsburg Monarchy. The opera is the only work of the composer to have gained renown.
The melody was included in the music manuscript collections of H.S.J. Jackson (Wyresdale, Lancashire, 1823), biography:John Buttery (English army, early 19th century), and flute player William Killey (Jurby, Isle of Mann). It appears in print in Bland’s New and Compleat Instructions for the Clarionet (London, 1798), John Preston’s Entire New and Compleat Instructions for the Fife (London, 1796), Preston & Son’s Complete Instructions for the Bassoon (London, 1790), Wilson’s Pocket Preceptor for the Fife (London, 1805), Andrew’s Complete Instructions for the Fife (London, 1808).
“Turk’s March [3]” was extremely popular with American musicians as well, and it can be found in the commonplace books of Jeremiah Brown (Seabrook, N.H., 1782), John Beach (Gloucester, Mass., 1801), John W. Stiles (1807), a copybook entitled Selection of Music as Performed by the Pierian Sodality (Cambridge, Mass., 1810), and Eben Irving’s music copybook of 1796 (Middletown, N.Y.). Printed versions are even more numerous: it appears in Bacon’s Complete Preceptor for the Clarinet (Philadelphia, 1818) and Joshua Cushing’s Fifer’s Companion No. 1 (Salem, Mass., 1805), James Hulbert’s Complete Fifer’s Museum (Greenfield, Mass., c. 1811), Joseph Herrick’s Instrumental Preceptor (Exeter, N.H., 1807), Norris & Sawyer’s Village Fifer (Exeter, N.H., 1808), and Klemm’s New & Complete Preceptor for the Clarinet (Philadelphia, Pa., 1825), and several other similar publications.
The melody has also been used for the song “Billy Bones.”
