The Great Elector's Cavalry March

This solemn march has been extraordinarily popular since its first performance and basically is an essential element of festive military ceremonies in Germany. Its title, however, may lead astray, as it has nothing to do with the Great Elector, since it only dates back to 1892. Its composer, Cuno Graf von Moltke, wrote it for the regiment in which he had served from 1884 to 1889, the 1st Life Cuirassiers Great Elector No. 1 in Breslau, and dedicated it to the colonel-of-the-regiment, Emperor Wilhelm II.

It was heard for the first time on the occasion of a musical entertainment at Prökelwitz in East Prussia on May 31, 1892 in an arrangement for cavalry music by the band of the 1st Life Hussars. Its staff trumpeter (i.e. bandmaster), Reinhold Lehmann, had written this fine arrangement of von Moltke’s march. On Nov 4, 1892, Des Großen Kurfürsten Reitermarsch (The Great Elector’s Cavalry March) was classified as ”army march” and assigned to the Breslau Life Cuirrassiers as their official slow march.