The appearance of high school drill teams became commonplace in the United States in the post-Civil War era. Washington, D.C., native John Philip Sousa, ever the patriot and advocate for education and educational activities, decided to celebrate the drill team at Washington High School, thought to be among the best around the turn-of-the century, with this colorful march. It would become one of his best known and most widely recorded.

The High School Cadets opens with a brilliant fanfare-like introduction, after which the main theme is presented. It is an energetic, somewhat jaunty creation, punctuated by crescendos and exuding a sense of tension, but tension more from happy excitement than from stress or agitation. The latter half of the march features a variant of the theme that is initially subdued and a bit less extroverted. But as was his wont, Sousa gradually builds it up until it takes on a celebratory, if not bombastic air, so as to end this work in grand style. At about two-and-a-half minutes this is one of Sousa's shorter marches, but it is nonetheless as rewarding as most of his better-known efforts.

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